Litter trained bun only using the box selectively?

[Arlo]

Heya.

I’ve had my bun for about 2 weeks now and when we adopted him, he was a gem. He was using his litter box about 90% of the time and never had an accident outside of his cage from the get go. Occasionally we’d find a few droppings in his cage near his box but that was about it – usually it was overnight.

In the last 5 days he has gotten really unpredictable. He uses his box about 50% of the time and is all the sudden peeing and pooping all over his cage. Whenever I am home to clean it, I clean it with vinegar/water to remove the scent and put the droppings in his bin but it doesn’t seem to be doing much. He had 1 accident on the floor outside yesterday but beyond that he is still going in his cage … just not his litter box. 

I feel like it happens more so when we’re not home/not in the room with him. When he is roaming while we’re home, he will always go back and use his box. It seems to me like as soon as we put him into his cage at night and while we’re out at various periods during the day for work, etc that he goes wild and pees wherever he wants.

He is between 1.5-2 years old, he has been neutered, weighs about 4.5lbs and hasn’t had any changes in his diet (hay, fresh greens and a few pellets). 

Just looking for some help/advice/any solutions or ideas what could be happening.

Thanks!

[Bunny House]

Have you actually litter box trained him? To train them they need to be in a small space with the box and as they use it 99% of the time then you slowly increase the area they have and then reduce if they use the box to make them only go in the box.

Any new animals in the house can make them territorial and mark the area they are in

[Arlo]

Yeah we trained him and he was pretty much set by the end of the first week. The only accidents that he had were inside his cage but right beside his bin as if he was just positioned wrong and missed. We started letting him roam once he was good on day 5 in the living room and he always went back to his cage to use his bin.

It’s just been recent that he had kind of gone all over the place. He is on the process of molting and we have noticed a mild change in his behaviour so I’m wondering if that could be part of it?

Would you suggest just trying to re litter train him if it doesn’t get better? I just would feel guilting confining him back to his cage when he loves his time out so much.

[Bunny House]

Molting can cause my buns to be agitated but they don’t loose their litter habits. Yeah you will need to retrain him because you can’t just give him total free roam without slowly increasing the area. Using a dog pen is the best way to slowly expand since they are easy to move around. He will quickly use the box properly so he won’t be restrained for long.

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