Can't seem to make him happy

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BINKYBUNNY FORUMS

This topic has 12sd replies, 6 voices, and was last updated 15 years, 10 months ago by skibunny8503.

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- 01/09/2009 at 4:13 PM
  skibunny8503
  Participant
  1338 posts
  So Archie wants attention ALL the time. I’ve been letting him out of his cage as much as possible. When he’s out he always tries to dig at the carpet, scratch at a door that is closed or he comes right over to us to be petted. I petted him for probably a good 10 minutes and stopped to let him run around and he just started digging at my shirt, nipping my hand and when I would move he’d lung at me. I don’t know what to do to make him happy. I don’t know what his past was like….maybe he had a girlfriend before, a bigger cage, or maybe they just let him run all around the house; who knows. His cage is a decent size but is probably small compared to an xpen. We’re going to put him in the basement as soon as we clear it all up. Actually I have a question about that. We had water leaking (might still be leaking if the problem wasn’t fixed) and one of the walls was starting to form black mold. Would that affect him at all? We’re going to take it out as soon as possible though. I can’t get a bigger cage right now because the room he’s in now is our office/sewing room and it’s small as it is.
  
  He’s still digging in his litter box, I think it’s because he gets mad that I put him back in the cage when he starts to chew on the carpet or he’s bored. I’ve put toys in his cage, made the jelly fish toy…nothing. He sniffs at them but that’s pretty much it unless they’re in his way. I ordered the cottage, a few grass mates, and a willow ball…so I’m hoping that they’ll do something for him.
  
  I love letting him out and everything but it’s hard to watch tv when I have to watch is every move and he wants attention all the time. Don’t get me wrong, I never regretted getting him, he’s a sweet bun…he can just be a pain sometimes
  
  Maybe I’m being impatient…we did get him right before X-mas…so maybe he doesn’t trust us yet?
- 01/09/2009 at 4:28 PM
  Cajunboi
  Participant
  42 posts
  As for the Black Mold… It’s deadly for humans so I would say the same thing for a Bunny… If you got him right before Christmas, he is still getting used to you… When we first got our Bunnies they wouldn’t touch their toys… Now they LOVE them… It was like overnight and they were having so much fun with them! Yes! They can be pains but they are so cute…
- 01/09/2009 at 8:33 PM
  Beka27
  Participant
  16016 posts
  mold (and dampness is general) is not good for bunnies. my concern about the basement is also the amount of interaction he will receive down there. he sounds VERY social, so unless you spend a good deal of time down there, at least a few hours a day, i don’t think that is a good location for him. he could easily become depressed or forgotten. can he be relocated to your main living or family room? even if you had to rearrange so he could have a 4×4 foot area for an xpen, that would be a better alternative than being alone.
- 01/09/2009 at 10:25 PM
  skibunny8503
  Participant
  1338 posts
  Yeah that’s what I’m afraid of too. We have a very small home and there’s really not room in our living room. We have a big couch, two recliners (don’t worry, we don’t sit on them when he’s out and I’m very watchful), entertainment center, 2 dvd racks….we couldn’t fit anything else in here. It’s also a walkthrough room; as soon as you open the front door the living room is right there and then you go to the bedrooms or the kitchen. We don’t have the sparebedroom set up yet (still stuff in there from moving)…it’s a weird shaped room but maybe if I rearrange things we can fit a pen in there. We’re going to clean that room all up this weekend.
  
  I spent a 1/2 an hour just petting him the whole time. He grinded his teeth a little but as soon as I stopped to change a channel or stretch out, he would go for my pants or shirt again…goofy bunny! I made him a cardboard hiding spot in his cage and I think he liked that. He sure likes jumping on top of it, he even played with the jellyfish toy and was pulling the newspaper from the top! I think it’s going to take him awhile to get used to us.
- 01/10/2009 at 8:03 AM
  Beka27
  Participant
  16016 posts
  it sounds to me like he’s already used to you! the fact that he’ll sit and tolerate pets for that long is a great! in this case, the pant digging and biting is not a sign of anger, but just a way for him to ask “PLEASE don’t stop!” many of us would give about anything for a bun that would want that much affection from us… ;o)
  
  i get the small house thing, 100%. my house is tiny and we have oversized furniture (you’ve seen my bunny-proofing pics, LOL!) i do wonder if the spare bedroom might be a better solution then. we have our buns in our third, unused bedroom, and it kind of opens to the living room and our bedroom, so even tho they’re not housed in the living room, they can come visit whenever they want.
- 01/11/2009 at 10:34 AM
  skibunny8503
  Participant
  1338 posts
  Posted By Beka27 on 01/10/2009 8:03 AM
  it sounds to me like he’s already used to you! the fact that he’ll sit and tolerate pets for that long is a great! in this case, the pant digging and biting is not a sign of anger, but just a way for him to ask “PLEASE don’t stop!” many of us would give about anything for a bun that would want that much affection from us… ;o)
  
  i get the small house thing, 100%. my house is tiny and we have oversized furniture (you’ve seen my bunny-proofing pics, LOL!) i do wonder if the spare bedroom might be a better solution then. we have our buns in our third, unused bedroom, and it kind of opens to the living room and our bedroom, so even tho they’re not housed in the living room, they can come visit whenever they want.
  
  Well that’s good that he’s not angry then! I’m not used to that because with Mickey, you’d take him out of his cage and he wanted to run around and didn’t care to be petted unless he was in his cage.
  
  We’re cleaning out the spare bedroom today. My parents still have to bring over the bed. It’s such a weird shaped room with 2 closets The 3rd bedroom is what he’s in now.
- 01/11/2009 at 3:58 PM
  Hedi
  Participant
  969 posts
  We have a small house for now and our 4 buns are in the basement. It is still a high traffic area but most importantly the buns are ok w/ the steps. We will usually let one out of the cage and allow them to stay downstairs to play in their cottage/maze haven for awhile and then we will force them daily to come upstairs and block it off so they stay upstairs with us for awhile. Sometimes during a work day to let them all have time out we will bring one or a set upstairs and then let another one downstairs to play. We have gotten into a routine and they understand it very well. They know that if they havent been let out in the morning then in a little while they will get to come out and play.
  
  That doesnt stop from them begging to come out and play but even w/ 4 buns and only 2 bonded-they all spend at least 4hrs a day out playing.
  
  BUT..our basement is half finished and that is the side they are on.We have never had any water leaks and we sit up on a hill. So it is completely dry and no mold or anything.
  
  For one bun it may be easier on him to be upstairs in an area where people will see him alot. With multiple buns they can entertain themselves.
  
  If you have a room that you can bunny proof and allow him free range in that room when you arent home that may make him happier. So he has more room to run and play when no one is home.
- 01/12/2009 at 1:52 AM
  Kokaneeandkahlua
  Participant
  12067 posts
  Oh yes the spare sounds like a better option. Mold has spores so no matter the type, I’d keep my buns and me away from it
- 01/12/2009 at 8:47 AM
  skibunny8503
  Participant
  1338 posts
  Ugh I hate going through boxes…it’s still a mess in our spare bedroom The more I sat in that room and imagine where the bed would be, the more I thought “where are we going to fit a pen or condo at??” We were rearranging the basement and there’s a ton of room where my husband wants to build the pen at. He’d be stuck up here until the summer since we have to fix the basement (just a little bit of mold but we’re tearing down the wall in the spring/summer) and we’re also going to get carpet for the basement.
  
  This is where he’s set up now…yes I know our house is such a mess! Oh and his cage….I made him a little house in there and a board to jump onto which is also a little tunnel…he’s tearing it up and pushing it around right now, so that’s why it looks weird, gotta go fix it after I’m done typing haha!
  
  He was sleeping when I took this.
  
  Here’s the spare bedroom:
  
  There’s 2 closets on both sides of the room.
  
  And the living room is pretty much out…oh I doesn’t look like that anymore, we have a nice entertainment center to store all the wires and game systems so he can’t get into them.
- 01/13/2009 at 9:36 AM
  Sage Cat
  Participant
  1883 posts
  Your living room photos are cracking me up – to explain why, I have included photos of my . . . um, my bunny’s living room. How about those crazy rugs?
  
  Are you sure you can’t rearrange either your living, dining room or kitchen to bring Archie into a main part of the house? It seams like he really wants to be around y’all!
  
  Bonus: Find the bunny’s in the photos!!!!
  
  111336127671.jpg
  1113361215454.jpg
  1113361217058.jpg
- 01/13/2009 at 11:09 AM
  skibunny8503
  Participant
  1338 posts
  Can’t do anything with the kitchen because it’s kind of small but there’s all cabinets and no free space and it’s a bit narrow, just enough for 2 people to walk through. Dining room….I’m still trying to find room for a humidifier I got the laptop charged up to take a new picture of the living room…you can see I just got a cottage for him! I finally got him to the top level and his eyes bugged out! He can’t figure out how to get down the ramp, so he just jumped off
  
  This is where we were thinking about putting his cage here in the basement. It would be huge, going across that whole wall!
  
  We’re going to get it carpeted too. We have a fake fireplace to put in place of the real one so it wouldn’t smell down there. I think if we work on it this spring and get it insultated it’ll look really nice. I’m home pretty much all day and hope to have a at home floral business, so I’d be in the basement most of the time with that.
  
  I spotted the bunny! hehe, I almost didn’t see him in your pics
- 01/13/2009 at 12:07 PM
  Sage Cat
  Participant
  1883 posts
  Oh, that looks like it is going to be a great room!
  
  We joke a lot about how the living room is 75% bunny zone!
  You can see Winston under the Papasan chair all the way to the left in the first photo & under the same chair in the middle photo.
  In the third photo, Kay is hanging out eating hay in the litter box – bottom right of the pen.
- 01/13/2009 at 12:34 PM
  skibunny8503
  Participant
  1338 posts
  Yeah I think it’ll look really nice once we finish it off. He’s so mischievious and gets into everything that we can put as many gates and boxes as we like down there. I feel bad for saying “no” all the time because he’s constintely trying to get into our masterbedroom (with huge furniture and lots of hiding space for him to get into trouble!), go behind the couch to dig. If we make a nice area down there then maybe…just maybe we can get a girlfriend for him. We’re not planning on living here forever, we’ll eventually need more room (we already need more room, at least to me we do ) Today he tried to get behind the entertainment center which has very little room..a few inches between it and the wall…little bugger almost got his head stuck! Poor thing! Hopefully he won’t be doing that again.
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