LakeCondo
Well-Known Member
I thought I'd start documenting the story of Honey, practically perfect in every way [at least so far].
She was upset of course when she arrived here, so after checking out her new xpen she spent the rest of the day hiding in her cardboard house. She even took her bites of greens for supper into the house. But she slowly relaxed & is now sprawled out near me as I write this.
To backtrack, here is what happened to Honey before I got her: She was bought by a family at a flea market. She wasn't fixed & neither was the male rabbit they had, so the inevitable happened. When her litter was only a few days old, the people were careless again & she got out & they couldn't get her. They called the Red Door Animal Shelter [rabbits, cats, & small dogs, no-kill] whose volunteers came out & found her. The people also surrendered her bunnies. She nursed them & was spayed in July after they were weaned. They'd all been adopted when I was lucky enough to get Honey November 19. Red Door does a good job of socializing the rabbits they shelter, including litter box training.
Back to the present, I've thought of 2 things to try that have worked out well so far, so I thought I'd pass the ideas along:
1) As soon as I got the xpen, I realized I didn't really want to lean down to the floor every time I opened the door. Luckily after a few days I remembered that I'd saved 2 grills from an old box fan that'd stopped working. It was so old that it had metal, not plastic, grills. I expanded the pen by fastening one grill permanently to the pen's opening & fastened the other on top with carbinders. To enter I just unlatch the top grill & fold it down, then step over the bottom grill. You could do the same thing with grills meant for something else. I think several baking cooling racks would be good.
2) I wanted to increase Honey's exercise, so I got something to make her work for her pellets. I got a FUNKitty Egg-serciser, which has holes for the cat's kibble to come out when the egg is rolled. I adjusted the holes to the smallest setting [as pellets are a lot smaller than dry cat food] & put some pellets in. Honey immediately smelled the pellets & began nudging the egg with her nose. In fact she was so good at it that I had to readjust it so that not all the holes were open even a little.
That's it for now.
She was upset of course when she arrived here, so after checking out her new xpen she spent the rest of the day hiding in her cardboard house. She even took her bites of greens for supper into the house. But she slowly relaxed & is now sprawled out near me as I write this.
To backtrack, here is what happened to Honey before I got her: She was bought by a family at a flea market. She wasn't fixed & neither was the male rabbit they had, so the inevitable happened. When her litter was only a few days old, the people were careless again & she got out & they couldn't get her. They called the Red Door Animal Shelter [rabbits, cats, & small dogs, no-kill] whose volunteers came out & found her. The people also surrendered her bunnies. She nursed them & was spayed in July after they were weaned. They'd all been adopted when I was lucky enough to get Honey November 19. Red Door does a good job of socializing the rabbits they shelter, including litter box training.
Back to the present, I've thought of 2 things to try that have worked out well so far, so I thought I'd pass the ideas along:
1) As soon as I got the xpen, I realized I didn't really want to lean down to the floor every time I opened the door. Luckily after a few days I remembered that I'd saved 2 grills from an old box fan that'd stopped working. It was so old that it had metal, not plastic, grills. I expanded the pen by fastening one grill permanently to the pen's opening & fastened the other on top with carbinders. To enter I just unlatch the top grill & fold it down, then step over the bottom grill. You could do the same thing with grills meant for something else. I think several baking cooling racks would be good.
2) I wanted to increase Honey's exercise, so I got something to make her work for her pellets. I got a FUNKitty Egg-serciser, which has holes for the cat's kibble to come out when the egg is rolled. I adjusted the holes to the smallest setting [as pellets are a lot smaller than dry cat food] & put some pellets in. Honey immediately smelled the pellets & began nudging the egg with her nose. In fact she was so good at it that I had to readjust it so that not all the holes were open even a little.
That's it for now.
