Is Citronella Safe for Rabbits?

Rabbits can be household pets or live in the wild. These animals eat grass, weeds, buds and tender twigs, as well as human food crops. What they don't like are prickly, tough and leathery plants, as well as milky, aromatic or toxic plants. The need to prevent human food crop loss against this herbivore leads some farmers to use citronella plant grasses and oil.

  1. Citronella Types

    • Chemical composition differs between the two citronella perennial grasses somewhat -- C. nardus (Ceylon citronella) and C. winterianus (Java citronella), but both can be used to make citronella oil, according to Drugs.com. The process of converting these grasses into oil involves steam distillation of fresh or dried citronella plants. Citronella oil has many uses -- such as making aromatic tea, flavoring beverages and foods, for medicinal purposes and as an insect repellent. Likewise, citronella grasses are eaten by animals too, such as rabbits.

    Rabbits and Citronella

    • Your pet rabbit will subsist on food items you provide, but wild rabbits will seek to eat plants and grasses from your landscape or garden. Discourage rabbits from eating your grasses and vegetable plants using citronella oil. If you follow citronella product directions when placing citronella oil on your garden vegetables -- especially the quantity put on each plant -- then this will be a safe repellent for rabbits and other wildlife, according to the University of Arizona. But just using citronella oil may not be enough to solve your rabbit problem. Using more citronella oil, in that case, may not be the solution. You may need to combine the oils with other methods.

    Significance

    • Reduce the number of wild rabbits you have to ward away from your garden with citronella oil by eliminating any brush piles or other protective covers in your landscape that rabbits can use to hide. Small animals such as rabbits are less likely to enter a garden that has a wide open space encircling it, as this leaves them too exposed to other predators, according to Colorado State University.

    Warning

    • Use of citronella in large quantities could be fatal to rabbits and humans. In fact, according to Drugs.com, the death of a child resulted after an unspecified amount of citronella oil was ingested by the youth and rabbits injected with a 1 to 4 mL/kg dose of citronella into their stomachs experienced paralysis and coma, followed by death.