How to RE litter box train *help please*

[Saphenous]

I have a 2 year old lion head/chinchilla coat female rabbit. She was a rescue, was abused in her previous home. I got her on May 6, 2014 and she was doing so well, was taking to the litter box, was only using the litter box. Things were great. Then about a month and a half ago all of a sudden she stopped using it, and started going on my bed. I’ve had to wash my sheets randomly because she has decided my bed is now her litter box. I have used new litter, added fresh hay, I was getting so frustrated. Around that time she also decided she was going to have “pillow babies”. (She use to hump a pillow and we called it the humping pillow, about a month and a half ago she had a “false pregnancy” and started to make a nest.)  She was ripping out all her fur, collecting scraps of yarn and fabric and built a little nest in my closet. She also became aggressive. She got to the point it took me 10 minutes to get her out of her 3 story cage which is quite spacious for a single rabbit. She is super sweet and snuggley outside of her cage, inside the cage she’s hissy, bites, lunges, grunts. I got to the point that she wasn’t getting over this aggression so I insisted we get her fixed. She was spayed on 10/23/14. She is about 3 and a half weeks post op here and things are already changing for the best. She no longer hisses or grunts when I go to pet/get her out of her cage. (I like to let her run around for hours at a time, I use to let her run around for 8+ hours a day in my room but when she started going potty everywhere except her potty pan I had to stop). So now that her moods are better due to the lack of hormones, I just put her in my room for the first time since her surgery and I am still finding little turds all over my bed…soooo back to doing more laundry! ugh! If I let her run around the house I have to put the dogs outside and I live in so cal. It’s freaking hot outside. it’s November and it’s 97 degrees out!. 

I’m just wanting to re litter box train her so she can run around my room with me. I miss her runnin around. She likes all her toys in my room. She has a carpet hut box thing, and a tower she likes to sit on. She also has taken up residence IN my bed side table, under my dresser, and I am thinking about making her a dig box. We have a ton of shredded paper hehehe =). Any tips on re litter box training is welcome. She spent the last 2 weeks strait in her cage so she’s already been trapped in there when she was healing from her surgery. The websites I researched what to do post op said to leave her alone and let her rest. So that is what we did. This last week (starting monday) I let her run around the living room for 3-4 hours a day. 

Right now… Buneary is passed out in the center of my bed, legs kicked out.

[drwil]

Put newspaper down in a smaller room like a walk in closet or bathroom. When she soils a spot of paper cut it out and put it in the box. Same with poop.
Do you put hay in her litter box? A lot of people say to do this. It worked for us.

[Tedster]

My room is not bunny proofed so Teddy doesn’t have free roam of it, however, he does have the majority of it. I made him a diy playpen and it’s big enough for him to run around in and get his exercise. I put a hay rack in one corner of his cage and then I put a litter pan next to it, so if Teddy wants to eat hay, he has to and will do his business in the litter pan. Peeing is more difficult to control, but I’ve never had a problem about that with Teddy, I got him home, watched him and he picked a corner where he usually pee and I set the litter pan there. He only pees in one corner and had never had an accident anywhere else. I also have one other litter pan attached to one corner of the playpen just in case and Teddy doesn’t seem to use it, so I took it away, but it might help you. If you don’t want the wire litter pan, just like drwil said, put hay in the litter pan. The only reason why I have a wire litter pan is because I don’t want Teddy to step on his own pee and feces because that will give him sore hocks and it’s easier to clean and I don’t have to worry about him kicking litter everywhere. Overall, definitely let your bunny start off in a smaller space to litter train her. Also, shredded paper might not be working for her, I realized that in the beginning I used walnut based cat litter for Teddy and it was fine, but it was more expensive, so I tried a cheaper option and he refuses to go in it. He held everything in for hours and hours until I finally gave in and went and bought the other litter. Anyways, best of luck to you!

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