Litter Training woes

Chins.. decided to start thread here cos nothing to do with sweet pea's grunting rabblit lol

sigh - i am having a tough time training my buns. The Mummy seems to have unlearnt all her training. She finally learnt how to go upstairs, and whenever we close our doors to her, or we are too busy to entertain her, she will pee outside the rooms or on the stairs. Inside the room, she will poo and pee as well. We are not sure whether she smells the scent of our first bunny who died about a year back and is aggressively marking territory.

I normally don't train the young ones cos i sell or give most of them away. Now that i am keeping one, i find it tough to train at first, cos there is only one cage and if i lock her in the cage, the other bunny will have no access to the litter tray and food and water. So now i am trying to train both of them together, since mummy is being totally mischievous. i lock them in their cages but allow them out for half an hour or so. The minute our backs are turned, or the minute they are let out, they will pee and poo.

Part of the problem is that they are used to roaming all over the house. They get so upset that the minute they are released, they show their displeasure by pooing and peeing. Yesterday we had some success. We allowed them out of their cages into a playpen area, and they behaved fairly well. This morning, they were back to littering again. Sigh!!

Hi Gypsy, thanks for starting a new thread on this.

I didn't have to train my baby bunnies. Somehow they learnt from their mother and just pee-ed in the litter pan by the time they were 6 weeks old.

You could be right about marking territory. Sweet Pea is litter trained but when I switched cages for the bunnies a few days ago, she pee-ed all over the cage for a couple of days before deciding to use the litter pan again.

I've had a couple of free roaming rabbits before. Generally, i don't allow them to roam freely before they are fully litter trained. My floor is laminate and pee on them is not good news.

I'm rather lax with them regarding litter training. All i do is that i put a clean litter tray in their cage and they go there automatically. If they don't do everything there within the first 24 hrs, i will use some tissue to dab at their pee and place it at the litter tray. Normally they get the message pretty quickly.

Does your adult female only pee everywhere when you close your door? Sounds like she's throwing a tantrum.

However, while i am able to pee train them, i have not been able to poo train them 100%. Although they deposit most of their poop in their litter tray, they do poop outside the litter tray as well. I don't really mind it as it can be easily sweeped up. After all, those little balls are dry.

I know what you mean about having problems because you used to let them roam freely. My practice is the opposite as i don't give them the freedom to roam without supervision unless they have been litter trained.

Are they in two seperate cages? If so, it'll be easier to litter train them

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No they share one cage. I also did not allow free roam till they are pee trained. Mummy Flossie was pee trained. But she seems to be throwing a massive tantrum lately. She's a terrible creature - very xiao chi - . if she's upset with us, they first thing she'll do is pee outside her litter tray. Currently there are a few changes in her life - and she does demand attention. The kids are having exams and i guess she is not given as much attention. The young one was allowed free reign cos they were sharing the cage with mummy, and when mummy was out, they were too - cannot lock them in cos mummy will have no accesss to food and litter and water.

Yesterday, they managed to escape the playpen area where i confine them during these days of training. Super smart these creatures, managed to pull at the grills until there is enough space to escape, And guess what - they both went to various corners and peed after binkying and running away from us! They're just plain rascals! albeit lovable ones.

Sweet pea you are so fortunate. Since mummy flossie is the main culprit of misbehaviour - that's y baby also not trained lor.

Gypsy, just thought I'd share that initially, Sweet Pea pee-ed all over her cage after her siblings left about 2 weeks ago. She's since stopped it and is back to using her litter pan. So you are probably right about your bunnies showing their displeasure. Hope this phase passes soon for you!