Best flooring for a rabbit cage?

Hi everyone, its been a while since I've posted (I've been busy with work)

I just wanted to know what type of flooring is recommended for a rabbit cage. Carpet? Linoleum? A combination of both?

:bunny22:

This is a good question. I was wondering it myself since I am planning on redooing my rabbit cages soon.

For now in my NIC cage that houses Shiny Things I have coroplast with bath tub stickers for traction on most of the floor. On the shelf she has fleece.

Beauty is in a dog crate and for the floor just has the metal pan and a small piece of fleece that tends to bunch up (and that she has been pooping on instead of the litter box).

I guess it would depend on what kind of cage you have and if your rabbits are litter trained or chewers.

If you have a NIC cage, then you go get coroplast, its really easy to clean and available at home depot. You could also get linoleum if your bun doesn't chew. If you had different levels in the NIC cage then you could put carpet on them as long as your bun doesn't chew. Carpet is not good to eat.
If your bun is a chewer, then you should get something like fleece. Its safer to chew than towels or carpet.
I think a lot of people use most of the things that I've mentioned. They may have different things to say based on what they've experienced.
So I guess it would depend on what kind personality/behavioral traits your rabbit has.

My bun has a plastic bottomed store bought cage, so I don't have to worry about flooring. She does have a rabbit fur blanket and a whole kitchen to call her own, my kitchen is hardwoods. She isn't a chewer though.

It really depends on the cage and the bunny, as was mentioned. My bunny chews EVERYTHING in her cage. I tried cloroplast, linoleum, rugs, those kids room puzzle piece things, and she damaged them all. Right now, I line the NIC grids with newspaper and top it with a bedsheet sheet or baby blanket and on the corners I banged in an extra NIC grid to hold down the corners. So far, no problems! As for lining the edges of the shelves like some people use cloroplast, I cable-tied strips of cardboard.

My rabbits live in an x-pen.
I have a tarp covering the floor. In the areas where they have dug at the tarp and torn it, I've put tiles down. Eventually the whole thing will probably be tile, but thats fine.

I use Linoleum flooring with a spot for carpet.

^same thing here

I have a rubber horse stall mat. Heavy as hell but fairly easy to clean. I thinks its cool because while its not as easy to clean as linoleium or coroplast, its not slippery and is kind of bouncy to rest on (ive done it my self).

I'm new here and dont want to start a new thread cause i had the same question. I build my rabbit a big cage and used tile flooring and now she slips and slides even though she did the same in the store bought cage. What could I line it with. She chews everything and would eat carpet at the moment i just put timothy hay everywhere to help her until i can get a real solution

I built our outside hutch with a (recycled) plywood floor. In the summer months I put 12" square ceramic tiles upside down on the floor. The inverted position gives Filmore a bit of traction and serves to keep the floor cooler with the added benefit of being a bit abrasive on Filmores claws. The tiles are removable for cleaning and are not interesting for chewing. I bet you could find some at the home center for not much money. DON'T USE BROKEN ONES! They will have sharp edges.

I got some woven-fabric-rope little throw rugs, like the kind you put as floor mats in your car or in front of your door. I put them on the bottom of the cage, and the bunnies love to flop on them and push them into piles. I bought them at the dollar store!

My littertrained rabbits have carpet flooring. We have a tile type of flooring in our kitchen and most of the rabbits won't leave the rugs when they're in there, so I can't imagine they would be comfortable on flooring like that in their cages.

If I were to go with an easier to clean flooring, the horse stall mats seem like a nice choice.

I've been looking into trying out these utility garage floor plastic tiles. Some of them are textured, so they seemed like a less slippery floor option for rabbits, plus they are a harder plastic so I thought they might also be more difficult for my rabbit to chew, especially if I work it so she can't gain access to the edges to chew on. Linoleum is just too slippery by itself, and carpet is impossible to use for my rabbit. I also thought of trying a rubber mat, but they usually stink of chemicals and that worries me with my buns nose being right near the floor all the time.

I guess you can see there are many options! I have found that it really depends on the rabbit - what works for one may not work for another.

One thing I try to do is have at least 2 flooring options in any cage so that bunny can choose his pleasure.

I've used wood, tile, linoleum, vinyl, rubber mat, carpet, woven rug, area rug, foam bath mats, double-sided bath mats and towels. One bunny chewed carpet so I didn't use it for him. Some of my buns were fine on tile, others weren't. Same with the linoleum.

My current cage has tile and also the foam bath mats. I think I have a photo of that "woven" rug I've used. It might be the same thing that buglady mentioned. --aah, this photo shows it but it looks a little grungy in this photo. At least you can see what it is.:wink

JBun- I would LOVE a link to what you are talking about I am "hopefully" getting the stuff to build a new cage for Christmas and will "hopefully" build it next month. Also if anybody has a link to those mats (not the heavy ones) I would love it.

I put foam tiles (like the ones for kids) in Ripleys xpen. If you do this, be sure to cover it with something so they don't eat/injest any foam. Ripley never was a chewer so I didn't worry with his, but last night he went and ate all this foam. Still worried everythings ok with him.

Here's a link for those flooring tiles.

http://www.rubberflooringinc.com/garage/smooth-flex-tiles.html

This is what they are. Just look around to find the best price. This site has a sale on right now, til christmas plus free shipping

I do have an NIC cage for him, and Im just wondering what kind of flooring I need for the bottom level of his cage.

FreezeNkody said:

I use Linoleum flooring with a spot for carpet.

Click to expand...

Is linoleum too slippery for a rabbit? I went to Home Depot and checked it out, but Im worried that my rabbit might slide on it. THough I know they are very easy to clean.

FreezeNkody said:

Here's a link for those flooring tiles.

http://www.rubberflooringinc.com/garage/smooth-flex-tiles.html

This is what they are. Just look around to find the best price. This site has a sale on right now, til christmas plus free shipping

Click to expand...

Those look pretty good, and it looks like it has good traction. Are they easy to clean? (And I missed the Christmas sale, lol.)


(sorry for my EXTREMELY delayed responses everyone)

So glad you asked this! Lots of ideas! My bun is a super-chewer and also hates tile/wood/linoleum cause he just slips around a lot. I've had towels down, which he finds uber-comfy, but chews a lot. Thanks for the tip about fleece vs towels. I'm thinking of maybe covering the bottom of his x-pen with a fleece blanket and then using the sheet idea over that and weighing them down somehow. Perhaps a little corner with tile in case he wants to lay somewhere cooler. Since I live in an apt, I can't do anything where I have to stick tiles to the floor (which is too bad cause those rubber floor tiles look great...

My buns all have Sticky Linoleum and I have no problems with anything, easy clean up. =)