Rabbit obsessing over couch? Litterbox training?

[MichelleandThumper]

I have a 5 or 6 month old dwarf named Thumper. And he has become obsessed with the one couch that's in our basement which is where we let him out to run around. He was neutered about 4-5 days ago and I'm aware that his hormones won't go away until at least a month or two. But he's not supposed to jump high and we've been trying to keep him off the couch but he won't listen. He ran into my hand a few times because he thought he could jump through them. Eventually I think he got mad that he wasn't able to jump up and if he did we'd put him on the ground. He peed 3 times on the couch before and had numerous poops but all were cleaned. Is it possible that he thinks the couch is his litter box? And that's why he keeps trying to jump on it? I out down a litterbox for him to use with some of the newspaper he had peed on from his cage inside the box and some lettuce and hay to encourage him to use it but ebony used it to grab food out if it. Any advice? He got nasty with me and was biting me after a few times I wouldn't let him up and for punishment I said no and put his head on the floor and he just kept trying to bite so I put him for a time out in his cage and when I went back an hour and a half later he growled a few times when I was opening the cage to let him out so I didn't let him out because I decided that if he was going to be nasty then he shouldn't be let out

 

[JBun]

It does sound like he is trying to claim the couch as his territory. Just keep being consistent. It sounds like he is in that teenage phase. Could be the leftover hormones or a dominance thing. What you did sounds good. A few things you may want to do differently. Some people don't think it's a good idea to use their regular cage as a time out area, so that they don't learn to associate being in there as a bad thing, so if you have a small cage that you can just use for timeouts, that would be ideal. And keep them short, just a few minutes. Maybe also just give one initial warning, something like a clap and firm 'no', then if he doesn't listen, immediately give a time out or use the momma bun technique. Key is timing things within a few seconds of the behavior, or they don't learn to associate the 'no' or timeout with the unwanted behavior.

Something to also keep in mind is some buns don't respond well to this type of discipline and may respond better to positive treat based reinforcement or training. But you may just need to limit his play area and wait a few weeks to see if his hormones fading helps at all.

 

[Laura_and_Trix]

What do the momma buns do?

 

[MichelleandThumper]

The mama buns put their head to the hound and hold it for a second or two, it's a non threatening way to discipline him because he knows what it is from birth. Since Thumper kept jumping on the couch and it was nearly impossible to prevent it without any hissy fits we used a water spray bottle to keep him off and it works! We started using his old small cage as a time out cage and put his litter box in the corner if his old cage that he used to use as his pee corner to encourage him to use it!