Saturday, August 19, 2006



Patrick,

I would want a lop eared bunny similar to this one. It's a Holland Lop, a miniature form of traditional lop eared bunnies and much furrier.
Rabbits can be house trained in about a month and a half...similar to cats, they like to go to the bathroom in the same place, and usually somewhere that is private or not surrounded by a lot of activity.

1. From day 1, you get a litter box filled with newspaper and woodchips. They will probably sleep there until you begin to put pellets in there and they will begin to recognize what it is for.

2. Once a pattern has been developed, you can open the cage door and let them hop in a small area. They will usually return to their box but if not, you watch when their tail begins to move from their body, clap your hands twice firmly, and lure them to their cage or pick them up and place them in the litter box. *with Rabbits, only positive reinforcement works or they will associate their litter box with punishment.

3. Begin to expand their space one room at a time and even place multiple litter boxes in the home (probably 3). The rabbit will hop, jump, and flit about and within a month and a half should be nearly accurately potty trained.

What do you think?

3 comments:

Megs said...

wow. I felt so behind...just read all your new blogs! I'm so excited for you! Totally can't believe it, though....at all. I'm sitting in Atlanta right now waiting for my flight to Brasil. craziness. I posted a new blog.

Patrick said...

Go for it (insert fist shaking)!

Anonymous said...

hey noel-
this is whitney..i think we actually only met once at stephen's wedding, but i saw your post and i knew i had to comment! i've ALWAYS wanted a miniature floppy eared bunny too! i acutally have a bunny back at home, but she's not so miniature anymore. anyways, if you end up getting one- as an alterative to housetraining it, you know those dog leashes that you screw into the ground and then there's like a 15 foot cord? well, we got our rabbit a little collar and she hops around our backyard without a cage-that way she's still outside, but MUCH happier. just a thought :)