Hello,
I've recently taken a rabbit in from a friend and I just need help trying to figure out how to manage my new bunny and cats. I'll try to keep this as short and to the point as I can.
So brief background. I've had my two female cats for 4 years and recently a friend came to us wanting us to take in her female rabbit (2 years) who recently lost her male bunny partner. She was indoors, then outdoors when he past away and we've taken her in and keeping her indoors but will let her in the garden from time to time soon.
When we took her in, we let her out in our spare room downstairs with her cage in the room. She was adapting to her surroundings super quick and is very friendly and didn't seem scared at all. So we thought we'd open the door and let the cats come in and see how that goes, the cats were just mega scared of her and for the first few days wouldn't even come downstairs and she had the run of downstairs, the cats do come downstairs now and we're the 2nd week in and they seem to be doing ok. They'll sniff each other but the cats will soon run away and bunny seems to chase the cats as soon as they go near her and if they go into her room, she'll chase them out a lot of the time.
We have a spare room upstairs which has the cats litter trays in and tumble dryer. I noticed last night rabbit droppings in that room and in one of the little trays we have, then later on downstairs I noticed one of the cats has got into the bunny cage and done a poop but then this morning the same litter tray that had the bunny poop upstairs, also had a cat poop. So weather the cats just didn't notice? :-/
We had the bunny on the sofa last night for a cuddle and I think she got excited and started jumping all over us and then we noticed on a blanket I had over me she'd done a wee and a few poops! :-(
My problem is I don't want two rooms in the house just for pets, we want to do something with the spare room downstairs which currently houses our rabbit but I don't know if moving her cage out of there now will stress her out and It does smell, we try and clean it out currently twice a week but I didn't realise how much bunny wee smells and also in the other end of the room from her cage is a litter tray that she also uses with a few poops on the floor around it and in it along with wee. I could move that upstairs and have a room of just litter trays but I don't know if this would confuse matters? Do they need their own space ideally?
I don't really want to have the bunny outside but I think it might be a better option to stop smell and give us our space back and just let her in from time to time??
I'm just really not sure how to manage my house. Ideally I'd want the bunny to have free-range of the house along with the cats and minimize smell and poops everywhere. Oh and bunny also eats the cat biscuits and I don't know if that's really bad?
I'm just struggling managing the three animals but I know people do it and have more animals and I don't want to give up on her. So any help and advice appreciated!
Oh and I found out the other day that she hasn't been spayed. So I'm looking into getting that done.
Thanks x
I've recently taken a rabbit in from a friend and I just need help trying to figure out how to manage my new bunny and cats. I'll try to keep this as short and to the point as I can.
So brief background. I've had my two female cats for 4 years and recently a friend came to us wanting us to take in her female rabbit (2 years) who recently lost her male bunny partner. She was indoors, then outdoors when he past away and we've taken her in and keeping her indoors but will let her in the garden from time to time soon.
When we took her in, we let her out in our spare room downstairs with her cage in the room. She was adapting to her surroundings super quick and is very friendly and didn't seem scared at all. So we thought we'd open the door and let the cats come in and see how that goes, the cats were just mega scared of her and for the first few days wouldn't even come downstairs and she had the run of downstairs, the cats do come downstairs now and we're the 2nd week in and they seem to be doing ok. They'll sniff each other but the cats will soon run away and bunny seems to chase the cats as soon as they go near her and if they go into her room, she'll chase them out a lot of the time.
We have a spare room upstairs which has the cats litter trays in and tumble dryer. I noticed last night rabbit droppings in that room and in one of the little trays we have, then later on downstairs I noticed one of the cats has got into the bunny cage and done a poop but then this morning the same litter tray that had the bunny poop upstairs, also had a cat poop. So weather the cats just didn't notice? :-/
We had the bunny on the sofa last night for a cuddle and I think she got excited and started jumping all over us and then we noticed on a blanket I had over me she'd done a wee and a few poops! :-(
My problem is I don't want two rooms in the house just for pets, we want to do something with the spare room downstairs which currently houses our rabbit but I don't know if moving her cage out of there now will stress her out and It does smell, we try and clean it out currently twice a week but I didn't realise how much bunny wee smells and also in the other end of the room from her cage is a litter tray that she also uses with a few poops on the floor around it and in it along with wee. I could move that upstairs and have a room of just litter trays but I don't know if this would confuse matters? Do they need their own space ideally?
I don't really want to have the bunny outside but I think it might be a better option to stop smell and give us our space back and just let her in from time to time??
I'm just really not sure how to manage my house. Ideally I'd want the bunny to have free-range of the house along with the cats and minimize smell and poops everywhere. Oh and bunny also eats the cat biscuits and I don't know if that's really bad?
I'm just struggling managing the three animals but I know people do it and have more animals and I don't want to give up on her. So any help and advice appreciated!
Oh and I found out the other day that she hasn't been spayed. So I'm looking into getting that done.
Thanks x