to roam or not to roam? plus who's afraid of the dark

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erikamc

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So, my boyfriend switched from night works to day works this week. It has been quite an adjustment for the bunny (she finally has a name-Rawrschach). When he was on night works she got lots of out of cage time, now, not as much. I try to wake up earlier in the morning when I am working day shift but I can't manage more than 30 min. Needless to say, she is NOT happy. She is angry at us and lets us know by being a huge PITA for the first 30 min we are with her. I'm wondering if letting her have free roam of the room will help with this or if it would be pointless because we're not there?

My concern with this is a couple of things. would it be better to leave the wall to wall carpet, or pull it up to either the hardwood floor, or laminate flooring (depending on the condition of the hardwood). I like that the carpet gives her traction for her insane zoomies, but wonder if her chewing on the carpet would be extremely bad for her. Speaking of chewing, thats another concern. I am planning on putting these panel things that they use in showers on the lower part of the wall. I would like to leave the baseboards, i know she'll chew on them, would that hurt her?

and here's a weird thing too, this is more a behavior thing. When BF was on night works, she would have light almost 24 hours a day. I would spend time with her when I would get home at 6pm, then he would spend time with her when he would get home between 1am-4am, and again at like 2pm. the light would get turned off between 1am-4am and turned back on at 2pm and of course the sun is up in between that. Now her light gets turned off at 9-10 pm and back on at 4am. during the night, she won't eat her greens and hardly touches her hay. Did we somehow create a bunny thats afraid of the dark? Do I need to buy her a nightlight, or just wait and see if she adjusts? She eats fine during the day, its just in the dark that she doesn't really eat.
 
Bunny proof the room and let her free - 30 mn is nowhere near enough, she's bored and frustrated (imagine spending 23h30 a day stuck in your bathroom and see how pleasant you would be when let out ^^). It's going to drive her barmy and she will drive you barmy soon enough (biting the bars, trashing the inside of the cage and stuff are classic). If you can't, at least attach a run to her cage to give her more space. If this arrangement is something that can become regular and that you can't spend much time with her in the future, it might be a good idea to look into spaying her (if it's not done already and that she's old enough) and getting her a husbunny. Pairs are a lot less destructive and entertain each other when we are not there. A single bunny stuck for hours on her own in a silent flat has nothing to do, so she will sleep and sleep and occasionnally find a way you probably won't like to occupy herself (by destroying things, mainly ^^).
My rabbits have been on hardwood always and did fine with it. Carpet can be a problem if your rabbit chews it a lot - does she really eat it? It can cause blockage if she does. My rabbits never chew on the baseboards but if yours do, you'll have to put something in front of them to protect them (I'm pretty sure someone talked about that in a post a few weeks ago, if you make a search on the forum you should find it). If you don't care about the baseboards, she won't die from chewing them a bit - all rabbits eat things they shouldn't, it's unavoidable ^^'.
Rabbits are crepuscular animals and they don't see like we do. I seriously doubt your bunny is scared of the dark, but having no real night time might have screwed up her natural rythm - if I let you in a room with constant light and no clock, you would lose all sense of time pretty quickly. Stick to a new routine and let her adjust, it sounds like a lot of things changed quickly in her small world and rabbits are easily unsettled (they don't like changes, or new things - some rabbits don't even accept people moving their stuffs) so the best is to change everything you have to at once and to establish the new things immediately the way you want them so that it doesn't change again. Your bunny will get used to it.
 
she will be spayed for sure. oh, wait, no she doesn't only get 30 minutes out of the cage! wow I worded that badly. I can only give her 30 minutes before work. then he gives her at least an hour when he gets home and one of or both of us do at least an hour right before bed. She gets more time out on his days off. He felt so bad about her not getting out as much this weekend that he was in there a lot. She doesn't chew on the carpet when we are in there with her, but not sure what she would do if she was alone. She gets crazy, she will literally bounce off the walls at times, thats why I'm a little hesitant to have a slippery surface.
 

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