Awful at night

[Hannah&mabel]

My rabbit has started being very noisy at night stopping me sleeping. She is out free roaming nearly all day and only caged at night.
She used to be fine at night, for her bedtime routine I put her in her cage with dinner around 10:30/11pm until she would get up 6:30/7:00 am. I do cover her cage at night, as very early on she chewed her bars but putting a blanket over stopped that, and she has low noise toys at night.
Recently she has started getting up earlier and earlier going from 6am for a while to 4am to 3am to 2 am (the time change has escalated very quickly in line with escalating behaviours). Her bedtime routine hasn’t changed.
If I don’t let her out she bites and shakes the bars, empties her litter tray, throws her food out of her bowl and generally destroys her cage. When I do let her out she continues to be destructive and keeping me awake.
I have also tried letting her free roam all night and again she empties her litter tray that’s in the room and destroys things in the room, this started even earlier from around 1.
During the day she doesn’t dig/ destroy my room/ cage. It is only at night. Her behaviour in the day hasn’t changed either and she will happily choose to go in her cage during the day.
I’m a bit stuck on what to do/ try next as I really need to sleep and she’s waking up other people and animals in the house as well. I would love any suggestions on things that might help.

 

[Watermelons]

How old is she and is she spayed?

 

[Kleb06]

Can you change the cage spots or configuration ? Maybe rearrange the inside. I have had some luck when changing things up? Also what kind of box do you have for her litter? My male HL started digging and throwing out his litter every night when he had a box like this (see pics). I bought a high sided cat box and no digging for the past 2 years.

 

[JBun]

Can you describe her diet (hay, pellets, veg, treats, and amounts of each fed), is she a good hay eater, what is she fed at dinner/bedtime, and her body size/weight? There may be some changes that can be made, to help channel that energy away from boredom and destruction.

How long have you had her?

 

[Hannah&mabel]

Can you change the cage spots or configuration ? Maybe rearrange the inside. I have had some luck when changing things up? Also what kind of box do you have for her litter? My male HL started digging and throwing out his litter every night when he had a box like this (see pics). I bought a high sided cat box and no digging for the past 2 years.

Thanks for the suggestions. I’ve removed part of the inside of the cage to increase the open floor space. Her litter tray hasn’t got very high sides so that might be something I look at.

 

[Hannah&mabel]

Can you describe her diet (hay, pellets, veg, treats, and amounts of each fed), is she a good hay eater, what is she fed at dinner/bedtime, and her body size/weight? There may be some changes that can be made, to help channel that energy away from boredom and destruction.

How long have you had her?

She’s a 4 nearly 5 months old mini lop. She has two hay bags that are always full. I give her a measured amount of pellets, and a small handful of veggies. I have increased the amount of pelletsas she has got bigger. She gets pellets and greens going to bed which she associates with getting in her cage at night. She then gets the same in the morning. She also gets a biscuit like treat or part of one during the day.

 

[Hannah&mabel]

How old is she and is she spayed?

She 4 nearly 5 months and isn’t spayed

 

[JBun]

She's actually at the age where you can likely start reducing pellets, and gradually switch to a lower protein grass based adult pellet if you're currently feeding an alfalfa based pellet. For the average pet rabbit, the usual recommended amount is anywhere from a tablespoon to 1/4 cup per 5-7 lbs. of body weight, depending on the metabolism and individual health needs of each rabbit.

https://rabbitsindoors.weebly.com/pellet-food.html

https://wabbitwiki.com/wiki/Pellets

And provided the rabbit is also eating at least a body size pile (or more) of good grass hay per day and maintaining a healthy body weight. The pellet amount, hay amount, and veg amount, will vary some depending on the protein content of the hay and pellets, and what each individual rabbits needs are to maintain that good health and a healthy body weight/condition. It's particularly important to keep an eye on a rabbits body condition when making any diet changes.

Monitoring your rabbits weight

To address the issues you're having with her at night, you need a way to redirect all that boredom and extra energy to something productive, and switching around the diet slightly can be a good way of doing this in some cases. What I'd suggest is to eliminate pellets from the evening feeding and start primarily feeding grass hay at night. The reason for this is pellets are a concentrated food, and so a rabbit can fill up quickly on them. Then what else do they have left to do with their time but find ways to get into trouble.

But it takes much more effort and longer for a bun to fill up on grass hay, as it's less dense nutritionally so more needs to be consumed vs the same nutrients from pellets, and is consumed more slowly a strand at a time. Free feeding only grass hay (and maybe some leafy greens) at night means your rabbit won't have as much time to be bored and will spend most of the time munching on hay and sleeping.

I'd start by gradually reducing the evening pellets over a few days. Gradually gives your bun time to get used to the change. Though suddenly stopping evening pellets and only feeding them in the morning, is an option as well. Then I'd top the hay off in the evening, with fresh hay to help encourage the hay eating. Do keep a close eye on how much hay is being consumed overnight. If your bun isn't actually eating hay very well, this won't work.

Your rabbit is also at the age where those pesky hormones can start causing behavioral changes. This can sometimes cause an increase of digging, marking, and nesting behaviors. Especially if she's experiencing a false pregnancy. They can get ultra focused on nesting behaviors for several hours to days, until it ends and the behavior returns to normal.

Watermelons brought up the spay question, so that may be something to consider doing to possibly help reduce these hormonal behaviors (won't always if the behaviors are a learned or natural bunny behavior and less hormonal), and also deal with the higher uterine cancer risk with female rabbits. If you go this route, a good knowledgeable rabbit vet is essential.

https://wabbitwiki.com/wiki/Spaying_and_neutering_rabbits

https://wabbitwiki.com/wiki/Choosing_a_rabbit_veterinarian

You can also make some changes to your rabbits cage set up, to reduce some undesirable behaviors. Like kleb06 mentioned, a higher sided litter box may help. Or like I've done for my rabbits litter boxes, use a screen to cover the litter to stop digging. There are a few options, but I prefer a soft pet screen or plastic cross stitch canvas. If you still want to give your bun opportunities to dig but during the day only, you could provide a dig box specifically for that.

https://www.rabbitsonline.net/threads/litter-box-tantrums.87864/

https://wabbitwiki.com/wiki/Toys_and_games

And to prevent cage bar chewing, there are a few options. One option is attaching clear plexiglass to the lower part of the bars that are in reach of those teeth. But leave the upper portion not blocked so you still get good airflow through there. Another reason to prevent bar chewing is that a rabbit chewing and pulling on those bars, can sometimes cause misalignment to the incisors, resulting in overgrown teeth that requires expensive dental treatments.

Cage bar chewing

https://bunnylady.com/rabbits-rattle-cage-bars/

https://how-to-rabbit.com/nibbling-chewing/