Wood floors and bunnies

[Allie2620]

I’ll be moving to a new place this summer (goodbye apartment, hello house) where the downstairs is all hardwood floors save for the bathroom and mudroom/laundry-room area.  I was thinking about putting Daphne in the back mudroom where there’s tile, with the plans to put grass mats or short-haired carpeting in her pen. 

However, I’m wondering about her free time outside the pen when I’m home – any of you guys with hardwood floors notice any issues with bunnies on the wood?  Or should I bring her upstairs where there is carpeting for her free time? 

The other option is putting her pen in my room upstairs so there’s no transport needed for her freetime, but I’m worried about the noise she makes in her pen chewing stuff, binkying, etc while I sleep or study – not to mention the hay and junk that comes with a rabbit pen crowding up my room. 

I know this will ultimately be trial and error, but I thought it’d be nice to hear some of your stories!!  Thanks!

[MarkBun]

How does your rabbit act now on tile or linoleum? That is basically how they’ll act on hardwood floors.

Bun pee can stain hardwood floors but if yours is pretty well potty trained, you probably don’t have to worry about it.

[Tate]

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again… Velvateen broke his leg because he slipped on tile and crashed into the fridge. Their bones are extremely brittle compared to their muscles and from what I’ve read, it is really easy for them to break a leg. Velvateen flat out refuses to go on any slippery surface… he jumps rug to rug at my parents’ house!
That being said, I think a lot of people have linoleum in their bunny cages and allow their buns free roam of the house, including on tile or wood. I have yet to hear anything like what happened to Velvateen, so he may just be an extra special bun.

[peppypoo]

My bunnies have never been fond of wood or any kind of slick flooring, and only tolerate crossing it to reach the next patch of carpet. I can’t imagine bunnies zooming or binkying on slick floors; I would suggest putting her on carpet.

[Allie2620]

She sticks to the carpet now – if I put her on tile, she makes her way to the carpet ASAP because she can. I’m not sure what she would do if there wasn’t a choice. I guess we’ll have to see I did read about your Velvateen, which is why I plan on lining her pen with non-slippery stuff if I end up putting her in a room with tile. As of now, she’s pretty well potty-trained (never pees outside her pan, but occasionally leaves a dropping outside her cage and tends to drop a few outside the pan within her cage), but she’s also just about 12 weeks, so who knows what the teenage years will bring…

[Lagomorphic]

I’ve always had wood floors with some rugs, and none of the buns seem to mind the wood. In fact, when it’s warm, they prefer to lay on the wood vs. the rugs. The only problem I’ve ever seen is if they get spooked, they don’t get good traction when they’re racing away. Sometimes it takes a new bun a day to get used to the surface if it hasn’t encountered it before, but it’s never been a long adjustment.

I haven’t had any bunny pee stain my floors. Rosie sometimes backs up too far (and up) in the litterbox and “overshoots” and pees over the side. Since it ends up going in between the litterbox and the wall, the pee can sit there a few hours before I notice it. It’s never stained. I just use Murphy’s wood cleaner.

[Beka27]

I would try and do a full size rug in the space she’s in. Even if rabbits are comfortable enough to hop on bare floors, they have difficulty getting any kind of speed.

[Elrohwen]

I would look for some cheap area rugs. Hannah doesn’t have a problem crossing the wood floors, but definitely prefers to spend time in her cage (it has an area rug) or on the living room area rug. Otto won’t even cross the wood floors except on rare occasions, so I’d say he has major issues with it.

At the least I think all bunnies need a good sized rug to do binkies and stuff on. If she doesn’t mind the wood floor, you might not need more than that. I got a 6’x9′ rug at BB&B for $30, and they had bigger sizes too (all very neutral looking, in a discount bin)

[Molzy]

I am a big fan of indoor/outdoor carpeting. You can buy it cheap at Menards or some such place (I think mine was under $12, but definitely under $30), and you can easily cut it to size. I used that when housing Riley on tile – the carpet was big enough to cut in half, so that I had an extra set. I would take one out when it got dirty (ie, covered in hay), and hose it off outside with a pressure washer or vacuum it with a shop vac and then throw it in my laundry. It worked awesome, and gave him the grip he needed to binky in his pen.

[LizzyBunny]

I have wood floors in my house too except for an area rug in my living room, and that is the only place Thumper will binky!

[bunnnnnnie!]

I think a nice big area rug would definitely be a good idea, but carpeting is certainly not neccessary.  Zeus has my entire carpeted living room at his disposal, and his favorite place to hang out is on the linoleum in my bathroom.  

[brittbritt]

Gabby’s area is hard wood flooring in the kitchen/dining room. Her food, water and litter box are in the laundry room where it’s linoleum. She has not had problems with the flooring and does not seem to mind it. I bought a couple of little cheap, square rugs to put in the rooms and I went to a yard sale and got two rugs for $2. One is a longer rectangle shape and the other is smaller. I don’t see her lay on them but keep them just in case.

In the living room my daughter sometimes has her cheerleading springy mat rolled out and Gabby goes crazy binkying on it. If it’s not rolled out she gets around good in here but doesn’t hop like crazy like with the mat.

[Dee]

I have hardwoods in the living room and linoleum in the kitchen. The only place downstairs that has wall-wall is the front hallway. I’ve noticed that Nelli, my fuzzy lop, skids a lot on the bare floor- she comes flying into the room and just keeps going right into the wall. And when she’s trying to stand still, she does the “moonwalk” thing- lol. BunBun does better, but I still like them having more traction to run. So I put a big rug in my living room, a runner in my kitchen in the “path” to the living room, and put scatter rugs in various places. Tha way they dn’t have far to go even when they’re on bare floors. I would love to have my staircase carpeted so they could go upstairs. BunBun can make it, but the one time she tried, poor Nell got stuck in the middle of the stairs and had to be rescued. We kind of herded her up the stairs (she won’t be picked up), making sure she didn’t fall, then loaded her into a carrier and brought her back downstairs. Quite an adventure :p. I’m SO jealous of people who have huge, carpeted rooms in their houses- all I can picture is my bunnies binkying across them!

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