When can I trust him enough to stay out of his cage?

[swarning1222]

I have a male who is nearly a year old. He was an extremely naughty little guy but he has come a long long way. So I have always only let him out when I'm home. He has been very well behaved around the house for a while now and I haven't seen him take a bite out of anything in a long time! So the other day I ran out for a few min to the store and left him out and he was good. Then I went grocery shopping another day and left him out and still good. Then yesterday I went to work for about 5 hours and left him out and he was an ANGEL!! I crawled around and checked everywhere to make sure he didn't do anything naughty and found nothing!! He only has access to the living room and the kitchen and no access at all to plugged in wires. However I have a cord that he could get to if he wanted too (it's NOT plugged in) and I left it there just to see if he would get into it (I figured if he wanted to be bad he wouldn't be able to resist that lol) and he didn't touch it! I have to hide jeans and sweatshirts from him cuz those used to be his favorite to chew and i stupidly left a pair on the couch on accident, didn't touch those either! But THEN after I got home and spent a good 20 minutes petting him telling him what a good boy he was, I was walking around changing my clothes and stuff and I look and he's on the couch with this angry little look on his face chewing a hole in my jeans! Idk what the heck his problem could have been!! He has been so good around the house and he HATES his cage, and I hate his pouting when I put him in there to leave lol. So is there any point I know that I can trust him enough around the house? Would you trust him leaving him again? I have rabbit proofed everything (except the walls of course which he doesn't touch anymore) and he has about 572 billion toys and boxes and cat towers/houses around the house to play with. And he is soo much happier when I leave him out. And more willing to go in his cage to go to bed! But idk what that little attitude was about last night!!

 

[Nancy McClelland]

We had the kitchen and family room "proofed" and we considered the furniture to be Sacrificial. You can go on "trust" but there may be an occasional surprise. Nancy used to take one to school and had a playpen set up in the classroom, which also worked well.

 

[Aki]

You can't trust a rabbit not to do naughty things anymore than you can trust a toddler. There will be accidents from time to time. Be sure not to leave anything lying around, put a hard plastic protection around the cord he can get to and then... protect things when you see that he attacked them. That's all you can do. It seems like he's already very well behaved : I don't know a lot of rabbits who would leave a piece of clothing alone if it's into their reach (one of my previous rabbit was a serial zipper-eater... 30 seconds was enough to have your coat or shoes ruined). Maybe your rabbit is like my dog: my dog won't touch anything if it's put in its proper place... if it's lying on the couch or on the floor, it's free game. I learnt that the hard way, after leaving a book on the couch and not immediately tidying up another book that fell from a shelve. He NEVER touched a book that was on a shelf or in a box, and I have a lot. Now, I know. Last week, I forgot a pen on the couch... guess what happened? I consider it's half my fault at this point (you don't clean it, you lose it, or something)...

 

[Blue eyes]

Don't leave temptation lying around (cord or jeans). That is just tempting fate and actually encourages his naughty behavior -- if it's there, then it must be fair game.

Keep his area blocked in and keep anything that is off-limits out of his reach.

You followed a good procedure by starting with short stints away from the house and gradually going longer.