Hello,

From what I understand boys in general, fixed or not, just have stinkier pee that girls do – I have girls and I know that sometimes if I am standing near their litter box while they go its a rather strong smell but it usually dissipates quickly. As for carpet – does your boy only poo all over the place or does he pee too? Because if its pee then the carpet is going to be a problem. For when you move you may want to consider a waterproof flooring like coroplast or plywood covered in linoleum inside the pen for the new place. Check out the habitats gallery on this website – it has some really neat set ups of all kinds. If you find there is a particular place that your boy goes a lot you may want to just add more litter boxes – it beats having to clean up the floor. I am not familiar with guinea pig smell so I don’t know what to tell you in terms of them but as far as I know bunnies – other than pee – are not stinky.

What kind of litter do you use? Using a more absorbent pellet litter (wood stove or recycled paper) may help if you aren’t using these already. There is also a kind of odor reducing agent you can use to sprinkle underneath litter to help if you find that it is their pee.

Do the guineas and the rabbits share a space and litter?

I can help with the guinea pig part of your questions. I have a cubes and coroplast cage for my 4 guinea pig boys and they are cheap to make. You can find more about them on guineapigcages.com.

As to the bedding I use for the pigs I use fleece with towels underneath. When fleece is washed and dried three times without fabric softner it causes pee to wick through it down to the towels I put underneath it. You can just sweep up the poops or vacuum them up. It keeps it smelling so much better than shavings or carefresh. Plus it’s so much cheaper after you have your supply of towels and fleece blankets bought up.

For more tips on that guinealynx.com has several posts on how to get started with fleece. I’ve been using the fleece/towel method for at least two years now and would not go back to shavings or carefresh for anything.

You wouldn’t want shavings anyway because of the fumes – then it would be really stinky and outright unhealthy for the animals. I use Carefresh Ultra as litter in my bunnies’ litterboxes and find it really keeps down odor well, but I’m not discouraging using the fleece on towels idea from brittbritt. Just also know linoleum has worked well as a surface flooring in my bunnies x-pens. I would imagine your carpet flooring is really retaining a lot of odor. I advise linoleum, I’ve also heard good things about coroplast. Definitely get rid of the carpet flooring for the x-pens. You also might want to check your bunnies’ anal glands. The glands’ secretion can build up into a waxy to a hard substance that adheres to the glands if the glands are not cleaned regularly and these REALLY stink. This can also be done by your vet but do check the anal glands to see if there is a waxy stinky buildup there. It’s really pungent while you are pulling away the waxy buildup with a moistened cotton swab or even just your fingers, but you will be relieved when it’s been accomplished and doing this regularly will keep them from becoming odiferous.

 My two bunnies live in my pretty cozy dorm room, and people were definitely noticing the smell when they came to visit me. I bought a HEPA air filter, and oh my goodness, the difference is amazing! Really, there is no more “bunny smell” unless you stand right next to the litterbox. I have this one: http://www.amazon.com/Honeywell-Permanent-…ref=sr_1_2 You just vacuum the filter when it gets dirty (there’s an indicator that tells you when to clean it). I found mine on Craigslist.

When I got my second bunny, he couldn’t figure out how to use the litterbox, and he was on carpet, which got very stinky.  I bought a box of laminate wood flooring from Costco- it was only $20 or $30- and it was the perfect size for their expen.  It was super easy to clean when he had accidents, and didn’t absorb the pee smell.  Now that he’s litter trained, I put down blankets so they have something soft to stand/sleep on, but I love the wood floor because it’s so easy to clean.

i use stall dry in my litter boxes, it works amazing and it doesnt harm them at all. it takes the smell of ammonia so there is no smell at all and it is quite cheap. i love it and swear by it!!! works great in my litter boxes for my cats too, lol

As Ginju said, you may have better luck with odor using a wood pellet or horse stall litter. I don’t think the carefresh does anything in the way of masking odor.