Food quality affects diet preference of rabbits: experimental evidence

When foraging, small mammalian herbivores do not show a preference for the forage with the highest biomass, which can be explained by several hypotheses (e.g. antipredator considerations, more difficult handling of tall swards and/or the higher nutritional quality of shorter grasses). We tested the ability of rabbits to discriminate between plants of different nutritional value and whether they prefer the most nutritious. A feeding trial in which rabbits (Oryctolagus cuniculus (Linnaeus, 1758)) were offered two different types of grasses (fertilised and unfertilised) was executed under experimental conditions. The rabbits pre- ferred the grasses with the highest protein percentage, when conditions were controlled for sward height/plant biomass. This obser- vation is equivalent to results obtained in geese and provides experimental evidence about the capability of rabbits to select for plants with the highest nutritional quality.