I’ll try to make this as clear as I can.
I’ll note that Merida’s little box habits are usually **impeccable.** When we adopted her, the Humane Society said they hadn’t had such a tidy rabbit in a long time, and she rarely poo’s outside her litter box unless I’ve done something silly like move it or try to clean it when she needed to use it. Occasionally she’ll leave one or two just outside the litter box, but I throw them back in and don’t really count that as an accident.
Last Thursday (August 1st), my boyfriend and I rearranged the living room because we needed the tv closer to an outlet, blah blah blah. Since we brought her home in February, Merida has always been in one corner of the living room. I’ve added to her original hutch (x-pen & NIC tower), but never really rearranged the setup. Unfortunately, the TV needed to go where Merida was, so her setup went where the couch used to be, and the couch/TV went where she used to be. I also made the mistake of changing around the setup IN her hutch (in a well-meaning attempt to give her more shade from the indirect light coming from the SE window).
Well. She was furious. Poo’d everywhere in her setup but her litterbox. Held her pee until she got her evening exercise and ran down to the hallway litterbox, still faithfully in its corner, and pee’d there. I changed her hutch’s internal setup back to the way it was. She poo’d everywhere in her setup for a second day, for good measure. Even left a hefty pile just outside her hallway litterbox, which is out of character for her.
The last 2 days or so she finally seemed to be accepting the new spot, but still didn’t seem to be peeing in her hutch litterbox as much as she used to. This morning when I came to check on her, there were poo’s around her pen again (though also in her litter box) and she seemed to have some urine on the pads of her hind feet. When I checked closer, I saw that her fleece blanket was soiled (urine), and it wasn’t just her hind feet that were dirty: it was also the genital area that was still wet with pee. I tried wiping her down with a warm damp cloth, and she was surprisingly calm (lethargic??) about the whole procedure. She’s also sitting in her cage right now, trembling occasionally. I don’t think it’s too cold, though I guess the residual urine (in the spots she wouldn’t let me get) and warm water would be contributing. (The room was ~71 degrees when I noticed her, now it’s 73 degrees- I keep a little themometer on the floor just outside the pen, so I know exactly what the temp is for her.)
Basically, my question is: could she still be throwing a tantrum about the new living setup, even though it’s been almost a week? Or does it sound like she might be sick? Should I continue to watch her for a while, or just take her to the vet now?
I’m kind of worried she might have given herself an infection if she was holding her bathroom business out of a mix of anger and fastidiousness.