My husband the cat whisperer recommends closing the door if you are not around to watch and make sure the cats can’t harm the buns until you are 100% certain the buns are safe. When around, leave the room gated as usual and if the cats make any attempt to cause harm to your buns, get them with a spray bottle or toss something like a soft nerf ball or can/bottle filled with coins to deter them. Also, try to have supervised interactions with the cats and rabbits and see if they can get along. If not, then just keep them segregated. Rabbits can to a point defend themselves from a cat. But if the cats have their claws and the instinct to kill is too high for them to cohabitate, better off not to risk it.

We have 5 cats and they pose zero risk to Momo, and she is the first rabbit they have met. (that we know of, the cats are all rescues) Most of the time they flat out ignore each other. But our biggest cat, a 15 pounder, is Momo’s best friend.

definitely close the door if you are not around to keep an eye on things. although, if they have that much drive, i don’t know that i’d ever allow them near the buns. your gate won’t deter the cats in the least, though. mine hopped in to rue’s pen all the time before i put the top on it. sol especially still likes to hang out on top and paw at the bun (no claws, he’s just playing).

My cat, Monkey, has a crazy strong prey drive. Somehow, he’s been really good with all of my pets. I’ve had the two buns of course, 2 dwarf hamsters, and 2 parakeets. He was interested, but I think maybe the fact that my smell was on all of the animals turned him off? He notoriously catches wild baby bunnies, yet he’s never had a problem with him. I agree with Joyfull_Music and Mossling though, I would keep the door closed when you’re not around.

I would keep the door closed anytime your not with your bunnies, at least for the first few months. You could try to earn the cats’ trust a bit… give them treats, feed them, etc. And make sure you touch your bunnies quite frequently to put you scent on them!
I think that cats and bunnies are similar in that they react heavily to smells and they both understand territory.

Cats are very quiet and stealthy when they want to be. I can see into my dining room where my bird cages are. So sometimes I don’t close my cat in a room when the birds are out flying around as I would see her going in there. One day I walked in to put the birds up for bedtime and my cat Abby was in the dining room and I never noticed her going in there. They can be so sneaky if needed.

I would close the door everytime- the cat is not going to “annouce” it is sneaking into your room to check out the bunnies by making noise so you notice- and if you do hear a commotion that might mean that there has already been an altercation resulting in wounds to your bunny.

If they are moving there is no reason to try to introduce them- better to be safe than sorry for a little while longer.

Years ago my mom put those little jingle bell collars on her two cats just to keep up with them better in the house. Smokey learned how to walk where it wouldn’t jingle. I always thought that was so funny.

I would also keep the door shut any time they are not within view. I have 2 cats and 2 rabbits, but my cats have always been indoor cats so they haven’t hunted small animals outdoors. They constantly chase and wrestle each other, but as soon as a rabbit runs up to them, the cats tense up and try to run away. The cats do like going in the room where I have the rabbits x-pen to watch the rabbits, and if they had the desire to get into the x-pen, they would probably be able to – but they’re too scared to get close to the rabbits (the rabbits have kind of put them in their place a few times with chasing and biting them). However, even with the cats being scared of the rabbits, i tend to keep the door to that room shut when i’m not home to keep both the cats and rabbits out of trouble. Also, one of my cats likes to reach into the pen to eat the rabbits hay and she always throws it back up, so that is not very pleasant either.

So basically if the cats are going to be gone in the summer and you do not plan on testing out socializing them, i would definitely keep the rabbits safe with the door shut because the cats will probably get curious and once they figure out how to get in there once, they’ll keep doing it (well unless your rabbits are like mine and chase/bite the cats).

 I don’t know for how long the cats will be there, but if it’s going to be a long while, and you need circulation in there especially if you have to worry about heat or just litterbox amonia smell  then I wonder if there is a way you could create a metal screen barrier — sort of like a homemade screen door or secured metal screen curtain of sorts.  But still keep secured gate at the bottom though so that the dog nor the cat could mess with pull on the screen.  

If the cats are there only for a short while, then closing the door seems like the best option.