HELP! Rabbit behaviorist!!

[cloud9]

I have had my rabbit, Cloud, for less than a year. She is a white dwarf hotot by the way. Okay, so my problem is that every morning from 4 to 7 AM she would scratch the cage door wanting to get out. The cage is quite big in comparison to most rabbit cages. I let her exercise for couple hours daily and feed her properly. She would make so much noise that would wake up my whole family! I have tried to put her out in the back porch during the morning and the sound would still penetrate through the walls. I cannot deal with this issue any longer! According to an animal behaviorist, what would be the cause to her behavior? I would wake up and give her a carrot, then after she finishes her vegetable, she would continue on with her scratching and biting the cage. What can I do?

Your response would greatly help! Thank you!

 

[Inle_Rabbitry]

Rabbits are naturally the most active during early morning and evening hours, so it's not very surprising that she's the most active at this time.

Depending on where you got her from, her previous owner may have fed her and/or had her exercise at this time and she may still be use to that routine.

There are a number of things you can do to correct this behavior. The most effective would be to simply put her in a run during these hours to give her some time to expel her energy, however I'm sure that this wouldn't be very probable for your schedule...

You could try giving her some extra toys, hay,and treats that would occupy her for a few hours.

There is another solution a friend of mine tried who had the same problem-She turned the cage around at night, so the cage door was up against the wall. This obviously confused or detered the rabbit from trying to rip the cage door off and the behavior emediately ceased.

Some people have tried spraying the cage with a bitter apple spray to deter the rabbit from biting it, but in my opinion, that has never really worked.

 

[cloud9]

I got her from a rabbit breeder when she was a baby. She was acting fine until she turned 4-5 months old I believe. I will take your advice and turn the cage door facing the wall with extra treats/hay. Thank you for your response!

 

[Kim1218]

Is she spayed yet? If not, I think hormones could be part of the problem. She should mellow out a bit within a month or so of being spayed. Shadow used to rattle the front of her cage like you described, but she hasn't done it once since she was spayed.

 

[cloud9]

No, I haven't spayed Cloud yet. But I am planning to spay her as soon as possible! I hope that she will become much calmer, especially during the night-morning!

 

[Amy27]

I use to put a blanket over Chase's cage and she would stop banging the cage door. Just make sure the rabbit doesn't eat the blanket. Chase has now been spayed for about 4 years, has a whole room to herself, has free roam of my 1600 sq ft house 8 hours a day and will still bang and chew the baby gate to her room. I think some rabbits just have more energy and want to be out. Luckily, I now sleep far enough away from her that it doesn't bother me. But when I lived in a small apartment. That blanket really saved me from a lot of sleepless nights when she would start banging at 2 am.

 

[MikeScone]

Scone's free run any time I'm home. When I first started letting him stay out of his cage all night he used to jump into bed with me at first light of dawn and start kissing any part of me he could reach - "I'm crepuscular, Dad! And it's dawn! Time to pet me!"

I would gently put him on the floor and tell him, "come back later, Scone". After a week or so we came to the agreement that he could jump into bed, but wouldn't bother me unless I spoke to him, and if the clock radio was on it was OK to wake me up. He's gotten so good at it that he'll often jump into bed just before the alarm goes off, then he hops up to my head and gives me nose kisses until I recognize him. I don't know how he knows when the alarm is about to turn on, but somehow he does.

On weekends he'll jump into bed at the usual time, but if I don't say anything he jumps off again and I'll hear him playing with his toys. It's only after about 8:30 or so that he decides enough is enough and wakes me up. Seems only fair.