Help! What do you use to house Flemish Giants & how did you litter train them??

[Gabrielle]

I’m so sorry that I’m so long winded here but I really need help and I’m desperate for some advice. My Flemish Giant bunny Sylvia (just a few months old) is absolutely the sweetest rabbit on earth and I adore her. She lives indoors in our giant finished basement which was covnverted into an In-Law Suite for me. (We have only ever had outdoor rabbits in the past. We rescued 6 smaller breed bunnies that were poorly cared for with their previous owners and lived in a large heated outdoor habitat with our pigs & chickens. None of them were really that friendly even after all the effort we put into them.) Sylvia is different though, our very first bunny we got as a baby and the sweetest most affectionate bunny I’ve ever met. I really can’t say enough about how much I love her. 

She lives in a large C&C cage that is so big I would let my cats live in it. But she keeps getting bigger and to give her the amount of room I feel she deserves, this C&C would be taking up the entire wall. I also don’t find it to be very steady and she occasionally tries to bust out of it. I have the bottom lined with multiple layers of vinyl fabric that is easy to wipe clean and is attached to the bottom of the C&C cubes. I then line that bottom with fleece on top of it too. She has a large litterbox. She hasn’t done well with any kind of litter and just kicks it out so I put puppy pads inside of it. She goes on it a lot. I switch out the pads at least 2 times a day (when I’m about to go to work and when I get done) and it’s always full of urine and some poo pellets. She is definitely using it, it helps that I have her hay holder hanging directly above it so she can munch her hay while she goes. But she goes everywhere else too! Theres like a third of the cage she has never gone in. But the other side shes always pooing in, not so much peeing. Most urine is in the box. But it only takes one accidental pee outside of the box to turn all the poo pellets into brown pancake shaped mush. So gross. I come home to this like every night and clean her cage out religiously. She doesn’t have accidents outside of her cage. Any time I am in my home, she is allowed to run free and she goes into her cage to pee always, though she drops some pellets around the house that I have to follow her picking up (one of the cats tries to eat it if I don’t get it right up!)

I’m really losing my mind with how to properly cage her. The C&C is an unstable mess that’s not big enough and the floor is constantly gross despite all my efforts and shes always walking through her own mess. I wish I could let her roam free through the house but the constant poop everywhere is not safe for the other animals & the family (we have 4 cats, 3 dogs, and a newborn in the house). I considered a regular cage with a tray that catches the mess but I can’t find one large enough for her and I read Flemish Giants should never live on wire floors. It feels like my choices are either let her sit in her own disgusting mess whenever i’m not home and then come home to have to scrub out her cage every single night, or put her in a cage that’s too small and has flooring that is bad for her feet. My mother hates that I’m constantly scrubbing this cage all day and that she makes such a mess in the house, and she wants me to have her live out in the yard where our outdoor bunnies were but I’m too attached to have her outside without me and I’m not comfortable risking her safety. 
I’m just so overwhelmed. Any advice on caging for Flemishes and housetraining her properly would be appreciated. Sorry for the long rant lol. 

[Rhian]

Have you looked into an x-pen? I’m not sure they’d be tall enough, but they’re definitely more sturdy than NIC cubes. There are various kinds of dog pens you can buy as well that come in sectioned pieces that you can make into whatever sized cage you want that I know many people will use for rabbits.

What kind of litter have you tried for litter training her? There’s all kinds out there, and there are various reasons rabbits won’t use one kind or another (for example, wood stove pellets can hurt for them to sit on so some people cover them up with soft hay or something like Carefresh). How large is the actual litter box you have? Ideally you want a box big enough that they can stretch all out and sleep in, because many will do just that, but again all rabbits are different and can be really weird when it comes to what they will and what they will not pee in. It’s best to experiment with as many kinds of litter and as many kinds of litter boxes as you’re able.

If you’re seeing her kick her litter out, and that’s one of the biggest issues you have with litter in general, a higher sided litter box is probably in order. And for that you’re probably going to need to get creative for something like a flemish giant. You’ll want to find something she can easily jump in and out of, that has a bit of weight behind it and that she doesn’t spray the litter everywhere when she jumps in or out. I’m not sure what you’re using now, but you may want to look into getting a storage container that you can modify a bit.

She’s also fairly young still, I take it? Do you know roughly how many months she is? If she’s creeping up into the 4+ month range she may be hitting her dreaded ‘teenage’ years where litter training can be next to impossible until she’s been spayed for a month or two.

[Myapaq]

To make your cage more stable I would recommend building a base from 2x4s, a sheet of plywood and adhesive tiles. You take the mesure of the length and width of your cage. Go to menards, lowes or any other store like it and buy a sheet of plywood as well as untreated 2x4s, you can probably get the tiles there too. Now cut the plywood to size, the 2x4s to size and screw the 2x4s around the perimeter of the plywood. Wrap your grids around the base and mark holes every 3 grid wholes or so. Now drill the holes and zip tie your base to it. That’s how I would recommend you fix the stability problem. For your issue with litter training. It is very hard to litter train a rabbit when they aren’t spayed. So as soon as you get that done it should be easier to train her. In the meanwhile I would recommend that you buy 3-4 fleece blankets from Walmart or the dollar store. They are usually around $2. Also buy some cheap towels or sacrifice some of your old ones. Put a layer of towels with fleece on top over the whole bottom of the cage. Change those every day or as needed. Wrap the blankets and towels into a burrito, put it. in a bag. Bring it outside shake it out, wash, dry, and reuse. Hope that helps! And good luck with yor bun bun. ?

[Tms]

I adopted a Flemish mix last winter, and I too am madly in love . I used a very tall dog pen, as Rhian mentioned above. I think it’s 6 feet tall. As for the litter training, perhaps once she is spayed and a little older her habits will improve. My Oscar has free run of two upstairs rooms and a hallway, and never has accidents. However he has a carpet where I keep his bowls and litter box, and he always poops all over it. I figure he’s marking his territory. Best of luck, I too have a young children and multiple pets, I know how busy it can get with daily cleaning.

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