by Anna Hofman

Created on: May 23, 2009

More and more people are keeping rabbits in their homes as House-Bunnie's rather than in hutches, which is fun for the rabbit, but when it begins messing all of your nice carpets and rugs, you're bound to want to teach it what a litter tray is actually for. Animal trainers have shown that amazingly, rabbits can learn faster than cats if taught properly and the training can be more effective on bunnies than cats. Here is the method that most trainer's use.

It is best to begin training your bunny at around eight weeks of age. If your bunny is older than this, the learning process will still occur, but it will take a bit longer.

Your bunny should be left in a relatively small space, such as an indoor cage or a small room, for forty-eight hours. (Provided with plenty of food, water and toys). The rabbit will select a main toilet area (so it is advisable to put down newspaper), and once the forty eight hours are up you should place the litter tray in this corner, to help with the association that the tray is for toileting, some of the original waste should be placed in the litter tray so the rabbit has it's own scent and doesn't feel afraid or uncomfortable. The rabbit should then spend a further twenty-four hours in the room with the litter tray and will usually continue to use it.

In the wild, rabbits will dispel waste while eating grass, so it may help the bunny to have food such as hay or dry mix in one end of the tray to make it's toileting feel more natural.

The litter tray should usually be cleaned out once every thirty six hours - any more and the rabbits scent may disappear, which will discourage the rabbit to continue using the tray, any longer and a lack of clean space will drive the bunny to find a more suitable location.

Once the rabbit has made the association and linked the tray with toileting, the bunny and the tray can be moved to other rooms in the house and tested to see if it continues to use the tray. If not, the same process should be carried out with a larger room, placing the tray in the spot the animal chooses, as the animal will choose a spot and continue to toilet there whether the tray's placed there or not - this is due to the fact they will seek out a spot that suits them as a quiet, safe spot.

This is usually an extremely successful method that is widely used and rarely fails, however if you have a much elder bunny who can't grasp the idea of the litter box, it's advisable to seek other advice from pet trainers who will use their own weird and wonderful methods until they find the one that suits your bunny.

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