Thinking about changing habitat

[MiNinoJack]

So I’m thinking about changing the xpen habitat that we currently have for a 2 or 3 story bunny condo. My thinking for this is that I can give him more play are when he’s out. I work from home so I leave his cage door open for the majority of the day. He only really plays at night, but likes to sleep in his maze haven during the day on the rug outside of his cage. 

He doesn’t binky very much and I’m thinking this might be because there isn’t a TON of open space. I mean, he has plenty of room for his bunny 500s and jumps up and down from the couch. He periscopes a lot on the couch and leans against the back sniffing upwards, so I think he wants to climb. The play area we have now is a 5’x7′ rug plus his 4×4 xpen. I have half the maze haven set up which takes up 18×36 in. of the 5×7 rug. He’s a small bun. Only 1.5 kgs. Adult neutered male. Age unknown – 2-3 years we think. 

He has spent the majority of his life in a 2×3 cage (with an hour or two daily play time at the shelter). He’s been with me about 5 weeks.

Do you think that change to a condo would be traumatic for him? I found a place online that makes the condos (I don’t think I could build a sturdy enough one on my own). 

Does anyone have bunny condo experience? Are there downsides? The biggest downside of the xpen for me is that there is a lot of floor space taken up and I worry a bit that he’ll try to jump out. He stands on his twigloo and, although he’s small, it brings him a lot closer to the top of the cage. I cover half of it at night, but it would be nice to not worry about that. If I get the condo then I’ll be getting another rug so that he can have a lot more space to run. 

I don’t have friends that have bunnies so I am just looking to bounce this off of other bunny people in case there is something I missed that is important.

I’d post the link to the condo I’m thinking about getting, but I don’t know if that would violate any rules. 

[Bam]

You can post the link to the condo you’re thinking of getting, it’s not like you’re trying to market/sell it I think it’d be useful for members to see it before they answer your questions.
As for him getting traumatized by getting a new habitat, I don’t think so. But it might take a while for him to make full use of it. Buns can be like that, but it’s normal for a prey animal to be a tiny bit reluctant at first before trying sth new.

[MiNinoJack]

I was thinking about this one from ebay as its far cheaper than some other’s I’ve found: 

http://www.ebay.com/itm/NEW-Indoor-LARGE-Bunny-Condo-rabbit-cage-pen-hutch-/260658783040

My thought with this though is to extend the top so he can periscope a bit. I actually use these wire cube squares to block off some areas I don’t want him to go so it seems like I could just add on another layer. 

I live in an apartment and don’t have the space to build something like this on my own. Its the floors – I can’t cut wood to size. If I had a backyard I’d be working on it already.  

There is another website with condos, but they are twice as expensive. They look sturdy and nice though: 

http://www.leithpetwerks.com/indexpage.cfm?category=1

[Azerane]

If you live near a hardware store like home depot or something (depending which country your’e from), they can usually cut wood to size for you if you were interested in making it yourself. That includes sheets of plywood and lengths of pine.

I have two main concerns with the condo, the first is the ramps. While carpeted ramps are good because they provide more traction, ramps take up a lot of space and the space at the end of them is a little squashed if your rabbit has issues going down them easily. The second is the carpet, perhaps your rabbit is already fine with carpet, but I know for a fact that some rabbits absolutely love to chew on and eat carpet which is very bad for them. Can you be sure that your rabbit won’t do this, and will you be able to remove the shelves and replace the flooring on the levels if he does? Otherwise, the only other issue is the space to stand upright as you have already mentioned which you said you would be able to remedy.

You would still need to put a sheet of coroplast or something on the back of the cage to stop hay and poop falling off the shelves etc, but with the cage on wheels it’s not a difficult task to pull it out and just sweep or vacuum behind.

At the end of the day, this cage still comes flat-packed so you would still need to assemble all the grid squares and attach the shelving units etc. Otherwise, it still looks like a well made product in terms of what they’re offering. I just prefer to set up things like that myself so it’s completely custom built to how I want it which is what I did with my 5x2x3 condo. At the end of the day it’s really about what works for you and your rabbit. How much hopping space does this cage offer in comparison to his current set up? I’m assuming he’ll still have access to the play area when you’re home and the cage is just for night time and when you’re out.

If you’re not sure about building one yourself, go through the steps of what you would need and how you would want the cage built, what you want to use for flooring and flooring surfaces, and work out what you can and can’t feasibly do at your own place. Technically the bottom level doesn’t even need a solid floor, you can just use carpet, fleece blanket or linoleum flooring extended beyond the base of the cage for the surface on top of your flooring in the room.

Also, in regard to those bunny abode condos, I would probably avoid them because the door openings are quite small and it would be a pain to clean out and access. Also much less customisation, whereas the ebay condo, if at a later date you decided that you wanted to add onto it or expand it, it’s very easy to do so by just adding more grids and taking away some existing ones.

[MiNinoJack]

Azerane – thank you so much for your thoughtful and detailed post!

Jack is already familiar with carpet – he doesn’t seem interested in it, but I understand the concern and would keep an eye.

You’re right about home depot. I could certainly ask what the charge per cut would be. And it would be so much cheaper! And agreed about the bunny abode. If there was something I needed to reach inside it would be super difficult!

You’ve inspired me to think harder about about doing this on my own. Thank you!!!

[Azerane]

No problem at all. I put a lot of research and work into the condo I have so am pretty dedicated to the cause

If he seems uninterested in carpet, you’d probably be ok. Bandit was big on chewing carpet, and then when I finally thought he’d outgrown it, I trialed a square of carpet in his condo and within half an hour he was chewing, haha.

[MiNinoJack]

I’m going to be thinking about some designs this week and see if its feasible for me to get it done this weekend.

How did you attach the wire cube pieces to the floors?

[Azerane]

For the base, I used a piece of plywood with vinyl flooring stuck on. The piece is slightly bigger than the base of the cage. Then on top of the base, I attached some lengths of timber, mainly as a way to prevent hay and poop etc rolling out over the edge. I drilled holes through the pine and just zip tied it to the cubes. However you could just drill holes in plywood if you were using that as a base and push the zip ties through there.

Here’s some posts and images from when I built the condo, because that explanation is pretty poor It starts halfway through this page, then continues on to the next. http://www.rabbitsonline.net/showthread.php?t=73547&page=39

[MiNinoJack]

It looks great! My guy isn’t as good of a jumper as your Bandit, so I would modify it a bit, but I really like the trays you built.

Do you feel like the vinyl provides enough traction and is soft enough for him to spend a lot of time in there (he likes his cage when he’s nervous – which happens more than I’d like. Less often than a few weeks ago though).

[Azerane]

The vinyl is a bit more slippery than I would like, when stretching or grooming his feet would slip out from under him and I would imagine if racing into the cage from fear it would be too slippery to negotiate at speed. Perfectly fine for hopping and lounging around and jumping up to the step though. I also liked to add a folded fleece blanket and a foam tile for softer resting spots, but often he didn’t use them, he just wasn’t big on soft things like some rabbits are. If you can get a more textured vinyl perhaps that would be better, although it also needs to be easy to clean so it can’t have the really grippy, gritty texture. Otherwise I feel like it’s always possible to just make a fleece blanket to size (like the guinea pig cage liners you see) and just clip it down at the edges for traction and softness over the whole cage it needed and then it’s still easily removed for cleaning.

[Q8bunny]

I know I’m jumping into the conversation a bit late, but I’ve also seen some gorgeous bun condos on the internet that are essentially just hacked cheap IKEA sideboards or shelf units with chicken wire(ish) walls attached around the exterior. They seemed really cost/time/effort effective.

[MiNinoJack]

I’ve seen those Q8! They are so cool. I live the way they look like real furniture, but it’s more work than I’ll be able to accomplish. I can probably get home depot to cut wood for me, but not IKEA shelves haha. I also need to rent a car to get the wood home, but at least I can use Zipcar.

I actually made a design today. I would just need to get home depot to cut a lot of precise (or semi precise) measurements and then I can put it all together in the area behind my building. I ordered more nic cubes today.

How did you do the doors Azerane? Just use binder clips?

[Azerane]

The doors have cable ties for hinges (they’re on tight and you can still swing it easily) and then snap hooks to hold them closed. This type: http://www.gorillaparacord.com/assets/images/1-snap-hook.jpg but I have seen some people use binder clips or other things to hold the doors closed. On my 2×2 door I used 4 clips. 1 at the top in the middle, then three down the right side, top, middle and bottom. I could probably get away with using two, but I didn’t want to risk being able to push the corners of the door and squeezing through. I used a double-ended snap hook for the middle one so that when I open the door and fold it back, I can hold it open by hooking it onto the outside of the corner of the cage

In terms of getting measurements for timber, I built my cage with the grids, and then measured. Although I knew the size of my grids etc, I just preferred to measure after just in case It probably wouldn’t have mattered for the base, but it was more accurate for the inside measurement I needed for my shelf.

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