Cage bar biting?

[ahrat]

My partner and I have had our lionhead for about 3 or so months now. He's about 5-7 months old. We have him out as long as we are in the house. He has free range of the house, if we're there and awake. I notice the problem only at odd hours. My partner and I are college students, so staying up until 2 or 3 in the AM is not uncommon between work and classes. Jerry, our bun, will just CHEW AND CHEW on his cage bars when we put him back in. He has been out for over 8+ hours today with his toys and his jumping bars (AKA our legs). When he's out he's binkying, running around like crazy, flopping over all content and comfy, so we know he's having a nice time. But it's driving us INSANE when we put him back in when we want to sleep. We usually wait until he hops back into his cage for a drink or a potty break and then we close his cage. He's still very reluctant to be herded or picked up to put him back, so we wait for him to go in. As soon as we do he is chewing on the bars.
I, personally, have grown up training dogs and raising mischiefs of rats, so my first reaction is to correct the behavior and proving myself as alpha. With dogs I use a sharp sound along with a tense nudge. With rats it's generally a sharp noise. Like a "AYE".
With the bun, I've been using a clap when I hear the bar chewing. It seems to be working. I just used it consistently for about 20 minutes, and he has stopped, and is sitting on top of his cardboard house. I just want to make sure this isn't stressing him out. I know they're prey animals, therefore very sensitive, and this is my partner's first pet that he's caring for on his own, so he has less knowledge than I do, haha.
We give him chew sticks, that he does chew on, so it's not out of necessity. It's very attention seeking. As soon as we get up to see what's going on, he stops and just looks at us. Like, "You closed this, please open it." It's ALWAYS on his door. Not any other part. I don't doubt their intelligence, my rats have billions of ways of letting me know they are confused or unhappy with being left in their cage for more than 8 hours at a time, haha.
If there's a better way to deal with this, I would love to know it!

 

[Azerane]

To me it sounds like you're doing the right thing. Rabbits are very persistent animals and you may find that he eventually gets used to the clapping and you may have to try a different sound. Another thing you could try, is to encourage him into his cage with some greens or some of his favourite treat, so that he isn't "trapped" but going in gets him rewarded.

 

[ahrat]

I forgot to mention, he's not normally a chewer. He will chew on things we place in his cage and allow him to, but he has never chewed holes in the furniture, cords, or anything else. We see him chew his cardboard house and cage sticks, so we know his teeth are being kept in check.

 

[ahrat]

I try to always put some kind of treat in his cage when we put him back in so he understands that his cage isn't a bad place. I've done this with my many rats, and they even recognize that hearing food being put in the bowl means time to come back to the cage.
Jerry is getting there, it's just I'm not there all the time to reinforce everything. My partner is a little more of a softy. And doesn't want to ever make Jerry feel "bad". He isn't consistent enough with name training and commands.
It's obvious because Jerry will respond better to me than my partner who is technically his main caregiver. Jerry will come bounding over when I say "up" when I'm on the couch and want him up their with me. But my boyfriend says anything to him, and he turns away like, "Please be quiet, human."
Guess I have to train the bun along with my partner! Haha.

 

[whiskylollipop]

Bunnies are notorious for being bossy little things and trying to train their owners. They cannot be trained like dogs (ie. by alpha domination) because they have no "pack mentality", or in other words the desire to please/not annoy anyone else. They do what they want. *insert Cartman gif*

So it sounds like your little man is trying his best to train you to open up his cage at his request. The best way to discourage this is too have a set routine where you only let him out and put him back in at the exact same time everyday, so he gets used to his "times out". But let's face it, I'm a college student too and class/work times are just too scattered to strictly enforce any decent out time routines.

Loud noises may startle him into stopping for a minute, but what's really going to send the message across is to simply IGNORE him. Are you letting him out when he does this? Or giving him food to distract him? That just reinforces his behaviour. Ignore him completely when he chews the bars. Let him know he can't make you do what he wants. Let him know his efforts at getting your attention are futile. He'll read the writing on the wall soon enough!

 

[ahrat]

We've tried ignoring. He does NOT appreciate it. We've gone about a week and half with trying the ignoring trick. He doesn't care. In fact, I think it's only gotten worse. I tend to sleep on the couch when I stay at my partner's place, so he can see me, and he knows I can't ignore him. And by 3 AM, my partner and I don't have time to mess around with a stubborn bun.
The sound doesn't seem to really startle him. He stops, looks over at me like, "what?" then will do it again. But, like I said, after 20 minutes of clapping every few minutes, he'll stop completely. He did so for a while. Then he did a few nibbles, and I clapped as I was almost half asleep, and he has stopped since then. I do believe he's sleeping now (thank god :zzzzz).
My partner and I don't live together, and he lives with 4 other people, so that much commotion isn't Jerry's favourite either. I'm hoping to see Jerry's personality really blossom when my partner moves in with only one other roommate next month in a much quieter and calming environment.

 

[pashpash]

we managed to stop it by covering the cage with a towel. we did cover all the cage but only the parts she like to chew.

It worked...

 

[Nancy McClelland]

Is Jerry neutered--it helps to moderate their behavior. I've got 2 that really rattle their bars if they see treats, food, or veggies coming but thankfully that is the only time they do it. Like Laura said above, bunnies are really excellent at training people. We have been sitting Peanut for a friend and he can't hold without getting nipped, but she doesn't do it with us. We told him she has him trained very well. Consistency is the real key to training, so, good luck.

 

[JBun]

Though it's true that rabbits aren't like dog packs, they do have warren's or colony's, and will have their own set of rules, including a pecking order. They don't quite have that desire to please like dogs, and are more independent like cats in this regard, but they can be trained and they can learn rules, some better than others, depending on how stubborn they are . Sometimes it can just be a matter of finding the right technique for a particular bun. Many people have trained their buns to do tricks, or even run an agility course. So training is possible.

Cage bar biting is annoying, but can also sometimes mess up their front teeth causing malocclusion. So it's great you found a solution. Having a noisy bun keeping you up all night is NOT fun If you do find he starts to have problems doing it again, you could try using zip ties to secure a piece of cardboard on the door, since that is the only area he chews, or you may need to mesh the inside of the cage with hardware cloth with smaller wire spacing(like 1/2"), so he won't be able to chew the bars anymore.

 

[Sophie's Humble Servant]

I also did the loud clap or I also click my tongue. Sophie will stop the unruly(to humans) behaviour immediately. She does know where she shouldn't be and is pretty good now.
She used to want to chew the legs of the table and chairs, that problem is solved with clapping/clicking. But if I turn my back for too long she will dig and bite at the sofa cushions lol.

 

[existenziell]

My lionhead, Hegel, is just the same way. Nothing has worked. Not ignoring him, clapping, thumping, or anything. He does it usually early in the morning or late at night after he has had his exercise time. I should mention that he is almost 2, is neutered, and has plenty of chew things in his cage. I've just had to learn to live with it. You might be in a similar boat, unfortunately. :/

 

[pani]

Felix tends to lick and chew at his cage bars if he wants out and he can see me. Sometimes he'll do it if I'm out of the room, but he normally stops pretty quickly. For him, it's definitely attention-seeking, but since housing him with Clementine he's calmed down quite a bit. Neutering helped, too.