Help with Behavior and Potty issues Please

[MANDYTLABUDA]

:brown-bunnyI recently adopted Sam & Allie. Sam 1 1/2 years old male. Allie 6 month old female. They are brother and sister from different litters. They are having a terrible time with litter habits although the rescue they were adopted from said they were litter trained. Not so much. As well as horrible litter habits, they are afraid of me and my fianc. We cannot pick them up and I know rabbits are not fond of being held but it makes it extremely hard when it is time to put them into their pen at night. they do not like us to approach them to even pet them. We have had them for about 5 days now. Is there something we should be doing? I am worried that if they go without human contact for too long and without correcting their litter habits they will never be litter trained and we will never be able to pet them or love on them.
Side note...I installed linoleum in the pen, they have 4 litter boxes, 2 corner boxes and two medium size cat boxes. The medium size cat boxes have timothy hay in them. They will sit and eat in the medium size boxes. I pick up all poops and place them in the boxes as well as using a paper towel and soaking up the urine and putting the urine soaked pieces of the paper towels in the boxes. I then clean the urine areas with a water and white vinegar mixture. The one corner litter box was used two evenings ago for poops and urine by the male I believe with only a few urine spots found in the morning but poops everywhere, but not at all since then. I am at my wits end. I am convinced it is me and am worried I am not training them correctly. Please help!

 

[JBun]

Just be patient. 5 days isn't long enough to really consider a rabbit settled in to it's new home. Plus they could still be hormonal from their spay/neuter and could be marking. It can take up to 8 weeks for the hormones to completely fade. If it continues to be a problem, one thing you can try is to fill their living space with litter boxes, so that they pretty much have no choice but to hop into one. You could just use large shallow storage bins for this. After they have been using the litter boxes for a week or two, you can try pulling out one litter box at a time, every few days, to see if they continue to use the litter boxes.

Handling a rabbit really is a skill. You learn how to do it by doing it(unfortunately ). Best way is usually one hand under the belly and one scooping up the bum, and just bringing the rabbit right to your body, then shift the hand under the belly to hold over the body shoulder area of the rabbit. With wiggly rabbits you do need to hold firmly(but gently) so they don't break lose and risk falling and getting injured. Do it confidently with no hesitation. Most rabbits learn to tolerate being held even though they don't like it. But even then some rabbits still hate being picked up and won't cooperate very well. You just have to learn to deal with it and handle them safely. I have one rabbit that has been held and handled since a baby, but detests being picked up now. She loves head rubs so I start petting her, then just scoop her right up before she knows it. She wiggles and grunts at me, but I just hold her firmly against me til she settles. Giving her nose rubs while I hold her usually helps. So it's really just learning what works for your rabbits. Using a small treat or veggie as a reward sometimes helps too. You may be able to pull up some you tube videos that show how to handle a rabbit, just steer clear of the crazy videos.

To help your rabbits to feel more comfortable around you, best way is to spend some time with them in a small area like an xpen or bathroom. Have activities for them to do, and you just sit there reading or using a laptop/tablet, and pretty much ignore them. For the first while don't even try to pet them, even if they put their paws on your lap. You can offer them treats. If you use sugary ones, only use a small amount and make sure it doesn't cause mushy poop. I prefer to use their usual veggies. If they aren't used to veggies, they need to be introduced in small amounts and gradually increased, one at a time. If their pellets are limited and they really like their pellets, you can even use their daily pellet ration as treats, and hand feed them the pellets. Once they get more comfortable with you, you can start reaching out your hand for them to smell, then eventually start giving them a little nose rub.

Another thing you can try to get them used to you petting them, is to do it while they are eating. Usually you can give a rabbit a few nose rubs while it is in the middle of eating it's food, as long as it isn't making them nervous.

 

[FreezeNkody]

I'm goin through the same thing. My male dwarf is a little over 2 years old. And will not use the box. It's my fault, there is an un neutered male in the same room. I've given up litter training. I just clean a lot!! Lol