Rabbits & cats, part two

[Boing]

Hi,

I have been giving further consideration to the idea of a rabbit.  

My cat is good, spayed and has no vices.  She only shows curiosity about the dog next door (I live in an apartment).  However, she did fail her multiple cat test, and the reason wasn’t recorded.  Sometimes they fail due to being too submissive, and she was not one of the cats in isolation whom I was warned not to let see another cat lest she get angry.

They are overrun with rabbits, but I really like one of them.  He is a medium sized 2 year old.  He and the giants have been overlooked all summer.  There are some others too, but I do not want the potential health problems of dwarves, lops, giants or rexes or the grooming of longhaired ones.  I also would like to have a rabbit that is well adjusted, as my experience is with a well trained senior whom I bunnysat.  This rabbit really fits the bill – he even comes neutered.

His name is Cincinnati.  You may view him here: http://ottawahumane.ca/adoption/petharbor_small.cfm  

They said that he is gentle, sits still for grooming and claw clipping, and is medium sized.  Then they warned me that things might not work out, because my cat is going on 9 years old (I have had her for two).  They said that if it were not for her age, they would endorse this, but since she is older, they advise caution lest she develop bad habits or lose her litter box skills.

What do you think?  Has anyone ever successfully introduced a rabbit to a household with an older cat, and not suffered such changes?   

Thank you in advance!  

Boing

[Roberta]

Yes… My oldest cat Twinkletoes was about 22 when my buns arrived and really didn’t care either way.. Any loss of habits was due to her declining health and mobility, my second eldest cat Bilbo would have been about 13 or 14, he fell in love immediately and the feeling was mutual. Jebediah would have been about 11 he was terrified, but then, Jebediah is terrified of everything, he is fine with them now. The other two Luna and FinnGall are both under 8 years old and at first thought they were toys, they like to talk to tghe bunnies through the Xpen but usually bolt in the other direction if the buns are on the loose.

[Eepster]

We once got a cat fro a shelter that had him listed as only being allowed to go to a home where he’d be an only cat. He had been given this designation based on the reason he had been surrendered to the shelter. Supposedly, he didn’t get along with the older cat in that house.  Since we only wanted one cat, it was fine.

We had an issue with our landlord, and our cat needed a temporary place to stay so he went to my parents house.   Our landlords were my inlaws, so it was really a family conflict.  (We didn’t live with them, they owned two condos in the complex, lived in one and rented to other to us.)

My parents of course had a cat of their own, and at first we were planning for them having to keep to opposite sides of the house, or some thing. They got along fine right from the start. He bonded so closely to their cat, that they refused to split the two of them up and kept our cat after we settled our living situation. (I was rather annoyed, but understood my parents POV.)

I suspect in reality the older cat was just cranky that his owners brought home a usurper. Or maybe his previous owners objected to him being gay (no really, he was and being fixed didn’t change it.) Who knows,but he was very happy to have his life long companion.

[HECA]

One of our cats is from a shelter. She is not “older”, but I did have cause for concern, because she doesn’t like other people other than my husband and I. She gets scared when other people are over… Even when workers are working outside our house. She also is a hunter. She was raised to be a “ratter”. We have a lot of geckos where I live, and she hunts them in the house. Low and behold… She had no problems what so ever with my rabbit.
My rabbit tries to snuggle with her all the time. She will do it when she thinks no one is watching, but she tolerates him very well.

She is also one of those cats that will pee elsewhere if here litter box isn’t as clean as she’d like it.  So I worry about big changes and her litter box habits… No problem there either.  My rabbit will also use the cats litter box and she doesn’t mind one bit. 

[Sindri]

I have a 9 year old cat and he didn’t loose any of his litter box habits or change his behaviors in any way when I got my first rabbit. he was a bit jealous but he got that way when I got our other pets. I would advice that if you do get the rabbit not to leave your cat and rabbit be together unsupervised.

[taija/honeybunny]

I brought my baby bunny (only a few months old) home about a month ago. I have two cats, an old man tiger cat who is very dominant, and a little rescue girl cat who is small for her age (2 years old). I just call them Big Cat and Little Cat. Little cat tolerates the bunny chasing her, sniffing at her. Sometimes they lay together, but sometimes Little Cat gets annoyed with my bunny and tries to bite and scratch her. I just yell “hey!” really loudly and she stops, but I don’t leave them alone together unsupervised!

Our older male cat, though, was introduced to the bunny. First thing he did was walk right up to her, sniff her and then tried to take a big bite out of my bunny! I keep him completely AWAY from my bunny. He thinks she is prey and he, naturally, wants to hunt her and kill her. I keep closed doors between the two at all times.

It’s hard to say with cats. Dominant cats, though, they will not be gentle with a little bunny

[Author]

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