Newly adopted five year old bunnies not using litter box

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This topic has 2sd replies, 2 voices, and was last updated 9 years, 4 months ago by Ollie and Summer's Family.

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- 12/03/2016 at 12:54 AM
  Ollie and Summer's Family
  Participant
  4 posts
  Hello! I just adopted a pair of bonded bunnies named Summer and Ollie. They are just under five years old and their foster mom (who had them since they were four months) litter trained them. To help the transition to their new home she gave us their litter boxes all clean and set up the way they like. Since they’ve been home tonight they haven’t peed in the litter boxes (I am less concerned about poop). There’s lots of hay in the boxes and we’ve seen our girl Summer grab hay from the litter box, but they are just pooping and peeing on this one mat from their old home. We immediately moved the litter box to the mat hoping this would fix the problem but they just poop and pee on the part of the mat that the litter box doesn’t cover.
  Is this just a way of them marking their new space? Or are they confused by the smell of the mat from their old house and the litter boxes being clean? Any ideas would be greatly appreciated.
- 12/03/2016 at 1:32 AM
  jerseygirl
  Moderator
  22356 posts
  Welcome and comgratulations on your new pair of bunnies!
  
  I suspect it is a bit or territory marking (claiming) of an item that is familiar to them. I would probably take the mat away for now.
  How have you got them housed? You may have to restrict how much space they have until their former litter habits return.
  
  Do you already have other bunnies at all?
- 12/03/2016 at 1:48 AM
  Ollie and Summer's Family
  Participant
  4 posts
  No these guys are our first bunnies. They are in a spare bedroom and have it to themselves. We talked to the rescue owner about starting them off in a small pen we had set up but she said they wouldn’t need it so unfortunately we no longer have the pen. rats! I will take the mat away and leave the two litters boxes where it used to be. Would leaving some pee covered paper towels from clean up in the litter box help at all? I’m undertaking the pee clean up soon (I was hesitant to do it right away if that was how they were marking the room but it’s getting to be quite a lot of pee between the two bunnies) and don’t want to confuse them.
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