Hello all! I’m sorry for the length of this post, but my wife and I are new bunny owners and want to make sure we’re doing the best we can for Mac and Jane.
We’ve had our bunnies for a few month now, and we’ve run into a bit of a tricky situation with them that we can’t seem to find any answers on. We’ve got the buns in a pen in one of our upstairs bedrooms, and we try to let out to play and exercise at least 5 times a week. The problem is, there’s really no room to play upstairs, and no room to keep a pen downstairs, so they need to come downstairs.
We originally tried to get them into their carrier to bring them downstairs, but this could take hours and the poor things were so scared by the first few trips downstairs they quickly learned not to get in the carrier at all. They love playing in our living room, but they hate getting there . Since then, we’ve resorted to carrying them downstairs- even though they hate it, it seems to bother them less than being in the carrier. So here are my two questions:
1) Should we be trying to use the carrier even though it takes hours? Honestly, this will come at the cost of play and exercise time, if we can even get them into it at all. Picking them up and carrying them takes seconds, but coaxing them into the carrier or leaving it out long enough for them to get curious and hop in may take all night.
2) Even if we use the carrier to take them downstairs, it’s our understanding that they need to be groomed at least once a week (they’re shorthair mini rexes, that’s what the local HRS chapter recommends) and have their nails clipped monthly. They’ll only sit still for this while we hold them, but every time we go to pick them up, they run inside their hidey boxes. At first we tried to reach in and force them out of the boxes, but that really upset them, so now the best thing we can do is to just pick the box up off of them and grab them quick before they can react. Before I do this, I usually say “UP” loudly as a warning, so they aren’t surprised. Still, they hate it, and it seems like they’ll never develop trust with me while I’m taking their house up off of them and picking them up against their will.
We’re both totally at a loss with this- the buns are playful and seem to like us, but we really want to make sure we don’t cause them any undue suffering or stress while still grooming them and giving them opportunities to exercise and play. Does anyone have any recommendations?