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I have successfully (almost) bonded my year old neutered mini rex to my two year old spayed lop mix. I say almost because he really doesn’t show her much affection, he is more interested in running around and destroying our walls and baseboards. Hence the problem. We got him because she seemed lonely and very inactive. We thought a mini rex would give her more motivation to play…instead, his bad habits have started to influence her
We have given him a slew of replacement things to chew: wood blocks, phone books, various cardboard houses (even the cottontail cottage, which he used to get better access to chewing higher up our walls), carrot shaped chew sticks on the bunny kabob thing, untreated branches (which he strips and whittles down to toothpicks in a matter of an hour), toilet paper and paper towel rolls.
Yet he insists on chewing, chewing, chewing. He pulls up pieces from our carpet, chews up the corners of walls taking off wallpaper and drywall with it, chews the wood molding around all of our doors and baseboards, and has made a huge dent in the side of his plastic litterbox.
We have both rabbits confined to our living room so we can watch them, he just does it so fast that the damage is already done by the time we catch him. If we squirt him with a waterbottle, he finally runs away after about the 5th squirt, but he always goes back to resume his destruction…sometimes right away
Clapping or stomping on the floor has no effect.I have tried bitter spray, rubbing perfume or vinegar on the areas he chews, and blocking off areas he chews…but he just finds something else to chew on. I can’t pull up all of the carpet because we rent and we are going to have TONS of repairs to do before we move.
I don’t want to sound mean, but he was the runt of the litter and he just does not seem as smart as our other rabbit that knows her name, knows she is in trouble as soon as she even sees the squirt bottle, and will let you know when she is displeased with you and hold that grudge accordingly (like when I cut her nails
) Like I said, I don’t want to sound mean and I have owned 2 rabbits before and I have never encountered a rabbit this hardheaded and irreverent. Any help is very appreciated.
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