Making the leap to free roam

[caillou]

I feel like i’ve been posting like a madman recently, so I apologize for that!

I’m moving to a new apartment on Friday and I really want Alfie to be free roam there. Currently he has a pet store cage that’s always open connected to 2 x pens and literally takes up half of my current room. He can’t be free roam there because I share the room with my sister so our stuff is always everywhere because there’s not a lot of storage space so it’s just too messy. What I’m wondering is what steps I should take to have him free roam? I know all about bunny proofing but what i’m wondering is if I should set up his cage at all? It’ll be a new area so should I set up an x pen with a litter box and have him practice that first? I’m just looking for the most efficient way to go about this process. He’s also getting neutered in about 2.5 weeks so I know I’m supposed to keep him confined for a few days/I’ll probably want him to have a cage if his hormones spike…

[ThorBunny]

I would lean towards keeping him in an x-pen for the first few days to let him get used to the new place, and so he knows where his litterbox and food will be! With Thor, we started with her hutch + x-pen, then after about a week allowed her to have full access to one room that we bunny-proofed. Then we gradually expanded the rooms she could be in until she had free roam of the whole apartment.

There’s still a section of the bedroom blocked off from her where we can plug things in. The rest of the place is hers, she’s quite the queen bunneh.

[Mikey]

Keep him in the cage an xpen until you have his entire space bunny proofed. After, I would still keep the cage, but leave it open, so he can always have a “safe space” for if he needs to get away

[caillou]

Just a quick update: we moved on Friday and so far everything is going great! He has an xpen set up in the living room and I’ve bunnyproofed like crazy and have been letting him hop around during the day. He seems to love it here, he’s been binkying around which I haven’t seen him do in awhile. His litter habits seem to have gotten much better with the new environment but I’m thinking after he gets moreno comfortable he’ll start peeing and pooping everywhere so I’m keeping my eye on him for now. I keep him locked up in his xpen at night which he hates but it’s all I can do. Although he’s begun chewing on his litter box and I’m worried that he’s ingesting some of this plastic. Does anyone have any tips to stop this?

[sarahthegemini]

You could try a large glass or ceramic dish to use as a litter tray?

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