House bun at night

[Nasreen]

Hi all
We currently have a lionhead house rabbit, who has full run of a double bunny proofed room and landing upstairs. At night time, he just hops about and isn't caged. However, I am thinking (mainly due to some serious skirting board and carpet chewing!) that it may be better if we gave him a play pen to hop about in, just at night time. He has a large outdoor hutch as his indoor base for going to the toilet, hay nibbling and just chilling out at the moment, but I was thinking of just putting a litter tray inside his play pen and putting the hutch outside to attach to his new run when it arrives. What do you think? The play pen would just be a night time fix, so I know he isn't up to any mischief.

Anybody have a bunny play pen for the night time? Would he use the litter tray, as at the moment, he goes in one corner of his hutch?

Sounds a good idea. They can be particularly naughty at night (looking at you Current Bun!). If he’s happily pooping in one corner, he’ll probably take to the litter tray easily - just put in some of his droppings so he gets the hint.

My boy is free range and spends most of his time in the kitchen, but at night he goes adventuring and when he’s not tipping up the laundry basket and rolling in the contents, goes wandering round the house and is found asleep in different locations in the morning. We do try to remember to shut the kitchen door.

We used to have a barrier to stop him going into rooms he shouldn’t at night. It was just wood with metal mesh that was the width of our hall. We just ‘closed’ that at night. Some times he’d break free and hop up onto my bed!
Our bunny didn’t chew any more at night but he did pee where he shouldn’t at night. Reckon he got excited when he broke free!

Ah these buns are characters at night it seems!

Think I will crack on and sort out a pen for him then. Can't face any more of the carpet being chewed and OH hasn't seen the grand result of the skirting as of yet!

Fernie, how does your bun cope with going down stairs (if you have stairs?). Our bun happily runs up them, but won't venture back down. Doesn't do well on the wooden floor downstairs either, or the quarry tiles in the kitchen. Ideally, I would like laminate upstairs and then put rugs down (but that is another debate to have with OH!)

Like the idea of the barrier, I was thinking of stair gates, but feel sure he would squeeze through!

I think you’re right with stair gates. Likely would squeeze his wee head through.

We couldn’t get laminate cos bunny wouldn’t walk on anything but carpet.

Current Bun can and will run on wooden floors, but only if he doesn’t overthink it. He’ll race across them with no issues if there’s something he wants to get, but if I put him in the middle of the kitchen floor and leave him to find his way to his rug, he’s like Bambi on ice! He rarely bothers with stairs, but can go up and refuses to go down.

Previous Bun (very grumpy female) ran around a house with an open tread marble staircase, laminate throughout the rooms and 4 Levels. We quite frequently lost her and would discover her on a bed or in the cellar. She’d happily go up and down the stairs at speed (freaked me out).