Burgess Pet Care; why Excel is the Number 1 Veterinary Recommended food for small animals

Members of the public have contacted Burgess Pet Care, confused by a recent marketing campaign entitled ‘The Campaign for Superior Quality Nutrition’.

Burgess Excel has, for over ten years, established the benchmark for healthy diets for small furry ‘fibrevores’; that’s why it is the number one with vets and the number one on the market. This ‘campaign’ is a marketing activity seeking to boost sales of a rabbit food range, by trying to raise doubts in consumers’ minds about competitor products, including our Burgess Excel range. At Burgess we think this is unfortunate, as there is much to do to help responsible rabbit owners feed their pets the right way. Confusion helps no one, least of all our pets.

Here we run through the main things mentioned in the ‘campaign’ and also the important points you need to know to keep your rabbit happy and healthy. Many of these, surprisingly were not covered in the ‘Campaign for Superior Quality Nutrition’.

The Numbers

The ‘scientific research’ upon which the campaign is based is very limited. We have been sent a redacted report (that’s one with lots of the information crossed out). However it is clear that in some cases only a very few tests have been done and that sometimes the maths doesn’t equal the numbers used in advertisements.

Some numbers that we do know:

Burgess Excel is 100% safe – our factory is only used to make pet foods (not industrial animal feeds), is audited to a human food standard by the BRC (the same one a supermarket trusts for your food) and has achieved the highest possible A Grade.

Burgess Excel is a 100% vegetarian range; although we do recognise that the very natural ingredients we use such as Timothy Hay (grown here in Yorkshire), meadow flowers, wild apple, camomile and oregano are crops that occur naturally and no field is a 100% vegetarian environment.

 92% of Vets recommend Excel; why? Well because we were the first to tackle the problem of selective feeding, the first to bring in a Light food for overweight bunnies, the first to understand the essential role of indigestible fibre. And, for 10 years now, they have seen the results - the Excel Feeding Plan is the answer to many of the health problems vets see in pet rabbits.

The Burgess Excel Feeding Plan is in a class of 1; only the Excel brand recommends everything that is essential for the long term health of a rabbit. Any single food claiming to be ‘complete’ or ‘nutritionally complete’ has missed the essential role of indigestible fibre in a rabbit’s diet.

The Campaign Omissions

There are two or three important things, which as a rabbit owner you need to know:

Beneficial fibre; this is the tricky part, but one that leading veterinarians have been talking about for several years now. Burgess Excel has taken their findings and turned it into a language that we can all understand. Basically your rabbit (and Guinea Pig, Chinchilla or Degu) is an animal that needs a lot of fibre in its diet. And when we say a lot we mean a lot – a wild rabbit will spend 70% of its waking hours eating on tough fibrous food. Now some of this fibre is digestible, that means it is food and contains the energy and nutrition that we all need to get through the day. However there is a second equally important indigestible fibre. This does three things:

Dental Health – the tough fibre wears down the continuously growing teeth. Too little and overgrown teeth occur; not only painful but potentially fatal

Digestive Health – rough cut long fibre keeps the guts moving that starchy foods alone cannot.

Emotional Health – deprived of all that chewing, your rabbit can get distressed and chew the cage or even its own fur.

Calcium/Phosphorous Ratio; although this sounds like school chemistry, it is a unique aspect of rabbit metabolism that they are not very good at dealing with too much Calcium in the diet. Also the type of Calcium matters too. A good food maintains the Calcium/Phosphorous ratio within strict limits and this prevents the build up of hard stones in the bladder – a very uncomfortable condition for your pet.  

Whilst marketed as a ‘Campaign for Superior Nutrition’, we do not know why these important points were ignored. In addition the crossings out in the redacted report covered up some tests, which we assume were to measure calcium and phosphorous levels. We do not know why the authors of this report would choose to hide these results on their own foods.

The Campaign Accusations

So what did the campaign cover? A lot of points were suggestions and inferences. Here we have stuck to the facts:

1. Sugar levels in Excel

Sugar naturally occurs in grass, plant and fruit materials in the wild and is a quick release carbohydrate, essential in a rabbit’s diet. Fresh grass can contain around 11% sugar, and up to 16% total water soluble carbohydrates - these levels are 3 times those found in Burgess Excel products. Excel Tasty Nuggets use grass as a main ingredient.

There is a suggestion that sugar levels found in rabbit food could have a direct link to obesity. As for any of us, obesity is a consequence of an imbalance of calories in versus calories out. Calories come from sugars, starches and fats, so focusing on trace sugar levels alone is odd. The total diet and total exercise must be considered.

As discussed a rabbit should have the major part of its diet made up of hay, such as Burgess Excel Forage or Burgess Excel Herbage, the number one component of the Burgess Excel Feeding Plan. This is slow to consume and naturally high in beneficial fibre; the ideal way to keep your bunny trim. Plus we would always recommend letting your rabbit exercise out of the hutch in a secure run, garden or indoors.

By the way, the redacted report did indicate that several Burgess Excel products have lower sugar levels than those products sold by the authors – these seem not to have made it into the advertisements.

2. The term Beneficial Fibre

We are not sure why the campaign complained about this phrase. Earlier we covered this important aspect of a pet rabbit’s diet. To always talk about digestible and indigestible fibre would be a bit of a mouthful, so we use the term Beneficial Fibre. All parts of the Excel Feeding Plan also list Crude Fibre, so customers can always compare to other packets. We also explain on our packaging what this term means, why it is so important and are at a loss as to why the ‘campaign’ has not acknowledged the role of indigestible fibre.

3. Potential Contamination in Excel

The redacted report had no crossings out in this area. Despite testing many competitor products, of several different rabbit food brands, for the presence of several types of mammalian and avian DNA all results, including Burgess Excel, were shown to be negative. This result has been confirmed to us by DEFRA.

Burgess products are manufactured in a mill that is audited to human food standards backed by industry accreditation and is British Retail Consortium (BRC) Grade A rated.

Conclusion

If you have read this far, we thank you for taking the time to get the facts. We hope you have learned a little more about rabbit diet and nutrition and fully understand that beneficial fibre as the centre of a balanced feeding plan is the critical element for your rabbit. If you have any more questions do contact us via the link below.