Need help with my 4 mo girl…

[iriswarrior1]

I adopted a male Florida white last April.  Smokey is a great little guy, friendly, well behaved, and VERY littertrained.  He was even better after we got him neutered, but he seemed a little lonely after a while, so we decided to get him a girlfriend.  I wanted to adopt from a shelter, but while I was shopping at my local pet store, my husband and daughter saw a litter of 3 month old bunnies, and fell in love with a little dwarf dutch girl.  My husband bought her on the spot, and took her home.  Smokey and Zeva are pretty much inseperable now.

 HOWEVER-I am having terrible problems with her littertraining.  Zeva is a little pistol, she has no fear of nipping or hissing to let her feelings be understood.  She pill-bombs and urinates wherever she wants, especially on my husband when he is on the sofa. We figure part of it is the complete lack of training and attention she received in the store, and part of it is budding sexual maturity, since she’s now over 4 months old.  After the vet oks it, we’ll get her spayed, but has anyone got any advice on how to handle her until then?  I’m seriously considering starting over from scratch with litter training, since she doesn’ seem to get that she should be using only the pan.  She does use it, along with everything else in the house. 

Anyone have any ideas or suggestions? Thanks!

[Sarita]

I agree that starting over is probably the only thing you can do – you are most likely correct it is hormonal and age related. I find the younger rabbits more difficult to litter train – I think keeping her confined until she learns how to use the litter box is best rather than giving her too much roam time in the beginning. Also have you tried putting some hay in her litter box to encourage her to use it?

[Beka27]

welcome here!

i’ll ditto Sarita. with bunnies, you can’t tell them in words what you want, so the best thing is to limit their run space to an xpen until those litter habits are back in place. clean up any pee accidents right away, poops you can toss into the litterbox a few times thru out the day. and make her litterbox as inviting as possible with hay and even a healthy treat mixed in. the more time she spends in her box, the more she’ll go potty in it. it’s possible that she will be topsy-turvy until her spay and shortly after. and since most vets will not spay until 6 months, you still have some time to wait.

here’s the BinkyBunny litter training page with step-by-step instruction… https://binkybunny.com/BUNNYINFO/LitterboxTraining/tabid/62/Default.aspx

some rabbits are easier to train than others, some get it immediately, even pre-neuter, others will struggle with it off and on for their entire lives. don’t feel bad about limiting her freedom right now. it’s only temporary.

[iriswarrior1]

Thank you both, I do put hay in her litterbox, and so does she!!!

Really, she’s nuts, she will try to crawl inside her manger , if we put hay on a flat tray, she pushes it out and poos in the tray, she squeezes her little behind into her four inch wide food dish, and balances there, pooing and peeing whihe she eats, then goes in the food dish afterwars.  We are constantly throwing the food out, because she soils it.  It’s funny, but then not, so we have to find a way to stop her wacky behavior without upsetting her.  She’s really handshy and distrusting, so we’re working on that at the same time.  Yikes.

[Kokaneeandkahlua]

Welcome here! I’d love to see pictures if you want to share!

You may also want to rearrange her cage a bit if shes pooping and peeing in the food dish. The setup I find best for training in a cage is the four corner method; One corner is the bed, one is the litter box, one is food and one is water. She may take very nicely to litter training if you put the litter box where she’s peeing-where the food dish is now!

Good luck and keep us posted!

[jerseygirl]

Yes pictures, if you can. You know, when I was reading your post, I got as far as little dwarf dutch girl and went “Uh-Oh” – lol.
She sounds spritely! I agree, limit her space until she gets it. The dutches are quite smart I hear, she’ll figure out she’ll get more freedom when she has better habits.

[Kokaneeandkahlua]

^^ Very smart and crafty!! LOL

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