Bigger litter box = Bigger mess

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FlutterShy

FlutterShy

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Hi everybody, my girl FlutterShy has a corner litter pan. She pees just fine in it, but the problem was that she would do some poop outside of the pan in the floor of the cage.

Since i saw that she was getting a little big for it i decided to get her a bigger littler box, which i was hoping would minimize the poop on the cage floor. She has had the bigger kitter pan for 2 days and mess is now even more than before as she is now trying to big in it (which she never did in the smaller one). Now the poop is not only landing on the cage floor but also outside of the cage since she is digging, LOL..

I can't win! She was recently spayed so not sure if that's causing the digging, or if its just a rabbit thing. Any thoughts? Should i put the old litter pan back?
 
Mine started digging in her litter pan too when I had a larger one so I switched her to a smaller corner one...she still digs in it so I put cardboard around the back and sides of it to keep litter from flying around my living room.I found too that taking some of the old hay the bunnies didnt eat and putting it on top of the litter stuff stops the digging a bit.
 
Sounds like your bunny is a digger! That's completely unrelated to litter box size - some bunnies like digging, some don't. To minimise mess you can get her one of those cat litterboxes with a cover, or make your own cover with a cardboard box or something.

The poop on the floor is intentional territory marking, also nothing to do with litterbox size. In a month or two after spaying when her hormones die down, this should decrease, although with many bunnies it never disappears entirely.

If you can find a scrabbly square of carpet, you can put it in her cage for her and see if she'd rather dig at that. I've even heard of people giving buns a cat scratching post.
 
That a great idea! It happens after she eats most of the the Timothy hay. So if i put some of bulk hay on top it might help it be less of a mess.
 
whiskylollipop said:
Sounds like your bunny is a digger! That's completely unrelated to litter box size - some bunnies like digging, some don't. To minimise mess you can get her one of those cat litterboxes with a cover, or make your own cover with a cardboard box or something.

The poop on the floor is intentional territory marking, also nothing to do with litterbox size. In a month or two after spaying when her hormones die down, this should decrease, although with many bunnies it never disappears entirely.

If you can find a scrabbly square of carpet, you can put it in her cage for her and see if she'd rather dig at that. I've even heard of people giving buns a cat scratching post.
Click to expand...

You have to be careful about giving rabbits carpet, when they are prone to digging and chewing. If a rabbit ingests carpet pieces it can cause a blockage. It's not really a good idea to have carpet in with buns prone to chewing. But for non chewers, carpet is usually just fine.

I've found covering the litter with a layer of hay, sometimes works. But for really stubborn buns, I've had to construct screens to cover the litter.

It's also possible your bun is just doing it as a temporary thing because of it being a new litter box, and she may settle down with it in a few days. Or like you mentioned, she's doing it when she starts to run out of hay and may just be digging to try and get to the last bits. So yeah, putting more hay in may solve it.
 
My rabbits went threw a period of digging in their boxes until I covered their bedding up with hay. Its like if they see the bedding ( I use carefresh) they want to dig. That might solve the issue your having.
 
Sophie loves digging. I buy coconut fibre mats for her and I place her log hut over it and she digs and digs like crazy. It's great because it keeps her from biting and digging at things I don't want her to. It's only rarely now that she digs in her litter pan or at the carpet in her cage.
 
My adorable (but bratty) Lionhead, Chive, LOVES to dig in her litter pan! The mess was driving me insane.... it would be over the entire room....

This litter pan saved my sanity haha! It works great to stop her from digging, and most of the pee sifts down into the bottom so she isn't sitting on the wetness. I used wood pellets in it as litter! It was definitely worth the $30

http://www.petsmart.com/cat/litter-...-catid-200094?var_id=36-20010&_t=pfm=category
 
Some of ours dig and some just don't. We consider them litter trained if they pee in the litter box. We've only had one out of 42 that pooped exclusively in her pan, pee on one side and poop on the other. Our poor shop vac is seriously overworked.
 
We have a designated dig box that roams around the apartment. It's just a cardboard box totally closed with a hole cut on one side filled with shredded paper. I hide oat kernels, alfalfa and some dried goodies within the shredded paper and they dig, rearrange and forage for hours. It's dark inside and it seems to help with the wanting to dig a tunnel aspect. Anya/Bino luv the dig box, Lulu likes to jump in and out of the box and Sebastian doesn't like anything dirty so he doesn't get near it. It really depends on your rabbit's personality.
 
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