Burgess Pet Care

Omlet is best known for its Eglu chicken houses and for resurrecting the popularity of keeping chickens in the back garden. But did you know they also make Eglus for rabbits too? For the second year running, Omlet have dedicated their newsletter to Rabbit Awareness Week and the nations beautiful bunnies. To view the newsletter please click here.

The newsletter is packed full of rabbit related news and information, including a short piece on the world’s smallest rabbit, the Columbia Basin Pygmy Rabbit (and check out the adorable photo) and an informative article on the importance of fibre in your rabbit’s daily diet.

Omlet are also asking you to join in with their fantastic Online Treasure Hunt, where you can be in with a chance of winning rabbit goodies worth over £500!

The prize bundle includes

• A Rabbit Eglu and run in your choice of colour
  
• One month’s supply of Burgess Excel food
• Other goodies to help keep your rabbit happy and healthy

Join the Online Treasure Hunt!

Want to win this wonderful prize? Here is how to enter…

Over the next week you will need to visit different pages to pick up our secret passwords. There will be one password to collect at 10am on each day of RAW, and you will need to pick up each one to find the clue to the next one. Once you have collected all five passwords you just need to send them along with your name, address and phone number, to stephanie@omlet.co.uk. If you missed a day don’t panic, because the passwords will all remain in their secret spots until Sunday 29th May. You have until midnight on the 29th to send in your entries. The winner will be chosen at random, and there are two runner-up prizes up for grabs too.

Clue Number One:

You’ll find your first clue and password on the Omlet Facebook page on Monday 23^rd April. You can view this page here http://www.facebook.com/pages/Omlet-Chickens-Bees-and-Rabbits/263228290641.

(Don’t worry if you don’t have a Facebook account because you can still view the page without one).

Make a note of the name of the famous rabbit and the next place to visit. There are five clues to find throughout the week. Good Luck!

About the Omlet Eglu

The Eglu is a twist on the traditional rabbit hutch. It is a modern easy to clean and safe home for your favourite furry little friends. Developed with leading animal behaviourists and thousands of hours of testing, its unique design enables your rabbits to express their natural instincts, making ownership more rewarding and enjoyable. It has two main areas: the house and a secure outside run. These two areas are available for your rabbits to use at all times, they can spend time in the house when they want some privacy or use the run for exercise or simply to watch the world go by. Together the house and run create a fun and stimulating environment for your rabbits. The Eglu Pet was designed to offer bunnies a clean, safe and fox-resistant home that allows them to express their natural instincts and offers a stimulating environment for them to live in.

Burgess Pet Care are staunch advocates that no single rabbit food can be classed as “complete”.  A rabbit has a complex digestive system which requires two types of fibre; digestible and indigestible and to help owners  incorporate this fibre into their pet’s daily diet Burgess Pet Care created the Excel Five Step Feeding Plan.

The Excel Five Step Feeding Plan is the UK’s Number One vet recommended food for rabbits and provides them with the perfect daily balance of fibre and nutrients.

Step 1  - Excel Herbage and Forage

Burgess Excel premium quality hay and grass foods are high in fibre and should for the bulk of your rabbit’s daily diet. Hay and grass is especially good for your rabbit’s teeth as they chewing action required helps to grind down teeth. Did you know that a rabbit’s teeth are constantly growing and if allowed to become overgrown can be incredibly painful and can lead to fatal complications?

Step 2 – Excel Nuggets

Burgess Excel Nuggets contain 100% natural, wholesome ingredients and include added vitamins, minerals and prebiotics. They are NOT a muesli style mix; because each nugget looks and tastes the same they do not encourage selective eating.

Step 3 – Excel Nature Snacks

The Excel Nature Snacks are healthy and packed full of fibre. They are ideal for rabbits as they promote emotional healthy by preventing boredom. They can also help the owner and rabbit bond because they can be hand fed. They can be given daily because they are packed full of goodness using only natural ingredients.

Step 4 – Fresh Greens

Rabbits should be offered fresh greens on a daily basis because they provide fresh nutrients and variety. However, you should pay attention to which foods you offer and the quantity you are providing. Keep quantities small; about a teacup a day is enough for an adult Netherland Dwarf Rabbit, whilst a large/giant breed will require substantially more. Good examples of fresh greens include kale, spinach and savoy cabbage. Root veg including carrots are high in sugar and should only be given in small quantities as an occasional treat.

Step 5 – Fresh Water

Fresh water should be made available each and every day. Make sure you check the water bottle and remember that it can freeze when cold outside.

Burgess are proud to have worked some of the UK’s leading small animal experts, including Francis Harcourt-Brown in order to develop the Excel Five Step Feeding Plan and to educate rabbit owners that muesli style foods are simply not healthy or complete. We know that this education needs to continue to help ensure rabbits are fed correctly and have long and happy lives. Through Rabbit Awareness Week and our Fight for Fibre campaign we hope to make a better life for our nation’s third most popular pet.

Rabbits require two types of fibre in their diet, indigestible and digestible. To ensure they extract as much of the nutritional value from their food as they can they re-ingest it, meaning it passes through their digestive system twice. Failure to provide the right kind of fibre can lead to illness or even death.

That’s why muesli type foods are such a problem. Rabbits, guinea pigs and chinchillas can become fussy eaters and will eat sweet foods as a way to get a glucose fix. As a result, they can pick out the unhealthy elements of the muesli and leave the rest.

This is called selective feeding and will inevitably lead to an imbalanced diet lacking in calcium, phosphorous and Vitamin D. Above all, this behaviour can lead to a lack of fibre. When taken with the fact that muesli type foods are commonly low in fibre to begin with, the problem is compounded.

Finally, the ingredients in muesli are high in sugar and starch. These are difficult for rabbits, guinea pigs and chinchillas to digest and can lead to health problems and obesity. For example, rabbits eat caecotrophs from their bottoms – obese rabbits often cannot reach the caecotrops which can lead to malnutrition.

No single rabbit food can be describes as complete. That is why we have created the Excel Five Step feeding plan, which encourages Hay (Excel Herbage/Forage), Nuggets, Nature Snacks, Fresh Veg and Fresh Water. For more information click here.

The ‘Crufts’ of the small animal world, The Burgess Premier Small Animal Show, marked its newly rebranded 89^th event with an estimated 50 per cent increase in attendance.

Previously the Bradford Championship Show, the recently renamed Burgess Premier Small Animal Show www.smallanimalshow.co.uk is the longest running show of its kind in the UK. Burgess Pet Care, already title sponsors of the show for more than six years, strengthened its partnership with the Bradford Small Livestock Society, organisers of the show, with a five-year support deal for the showcase event.

With Burgess Pet Care’s increased investment into the show, including development of a new brand, new website, new marketing literature and a greater number of attractions and events taking place over the two day event, the show sold out its trade area and doubled public attendance figures, compared to the previous year.

The Yorkshire Event Centre-based show housed the UK’s first Rabbit Grand National within its new Showcase Square, a hub of activity at the show. Swedish competitors flew into Harrogate especially for the event, which saw champion bouncing bunny Cherie and her owner Magdalena Åhsblom take the top spot.

Mr Burgess, president of the show and chairman of Burgess, said: “We are overwhelmed by the sheer success of this year’s show, which has attracted an estimated 50 per cent higher attendance.  We are a company of pet lovers and owners who are committed to making the lives of pets better by encouraging responsible pet ownership. We are avid supporters of the Burgess Premier Small Animal Show as it is a festival for people who are passionate about animals, and as a business it gives us a superb platform to communicate our pet food ranges for small animals, including Excel the UK’s No.1 vet recommended range for fibrevores. We look forward to building on this year’s success at next year’s show, to celebrate 90 years of the Small Animal Show.”

Burgess Pet Care is a small family-owned Yorkshire business which makes high quality food for all small furry pets. Leaders in the field of pet nutrition and care, our products include Burgess Excel, the UK’s number one vet recommended food for small animals, as well as Supadog, Supacat, Supahamster, Suparat, Supagerbil and Supaferret.

For further information about Burgess Pet Care please visit www.burgesspetcare.co.uk

Dear Naomi

Very many thanks for my huuuge treat box filled with all my favourite nibbles.

The box included far more than I ever could have expected and I feel this is extremely generous of Burgess.

Miss Una Bunny

I will look forward to eating them all – and try not to lose my perfect photogenic figure in the process!

Thank You

Your photographic model runner-up

Miss Una Bunny