The Rabbit House» rabbit-enrichment Archives – The Rabbit House

Autumn Leaves

Tamsin — Fri, 28 Oct 2011 17:41:28 +0000

It’s getting a bit chilly and the leaves are turning on another year. I love autumn leaves, the colours, the crisp crunch as you walk on them, even the smell.

Just because Scamp’s a house bunny, I don’t see why he can’t enjoy some of the autumn season too. These are leaves from our grape vine, it’s a bit damp at the moment, so I collected them on a dry day and left them to dry out, like I did with the other dry leaves a few weeks ago.

What do you think, Scamp?

Then I piled them up in his favourite corner:

And he quickly popped out of bed to take a look. He wasn’t completely sure about the crunching sound when he walked on them at first, but he got over it fairly quickly once he realised he could eat them!

I think autumn colours rather suit him!

Dry leaves can be eaten, picked up and tossed, crunched under your paws and dug through – wonderful rabbit enrichment.

Rabbit Ball Pit

Tamsin — Sat, 27 Aug 2011 20:59:26 +0000

My bunny book is with the printer, so it’s time to relax and have some fun! We’ve had a sack of children’s play balls sitting in the garage for ages so I thought I’d see what Scamp thought. They are the sort of balls you find in ball pits so they are quite soft plastic and very light. They wouldn’t stand up to chewing but are cheap and good for nudging about.

As you can see, the pesky balls are all in the wrong place and need rearranging and rearranging, and shouldn’t that yellow one go on the left instead.

And for those that like live action rabbits, a quick video too:

Rabbit Agility

Tamsin — Fri, 11 Mar 2011 21:37:51 +0000

I was trying to think up another rabbit toy for Scamp’s ongoing adventures with cardboard tubes. Then Lisa mentioned agility training. Now I’d thought about this before, and then thought maybe it’s not such a good idea to encourage him to jump over things in case he remembers he can jump on the kitchen worktops or tries to take on the baby gate keeping him contained. However surely little jumps would be okay (yes, probably famous last words) he jumps over little things anyway. So here is my next toilet roll tube rabbit toy idea (drum roll, please)… bunny jumps!

They are very simple to make, you need an even number of cardboard tubes, some sticks, and some scissors.

Stab the cardboard with the scissors (making sure not to take out a finger) and post the sticks in. I used two sticks per tube but you could probably get away with one. If you are going for crossed sticks, then offset the bottom and top holes so there is room for the sticks to overlap.

Now, I believe at this point there is meant to be some training with treats or clickers and possibly some strict instructions about not eating the props but I thought first go I’d just give him a call and see what happened. I admit I was expecting something on the lines of ‘oooo stick, I’ll throw that’, hop, ‘oooo another stick, I’ll eat that’, hop, ‘I’m bored of stick, I’m off’. This is how it actually went…

Bit of a natural!

I tried action photos too, but he’s a bit quick. This blur is him (no really!)

Cardboard Tube Toys (Part 3)

Tamsin — Thu, 10 Feb 2011 00:24:05 +0000

The cardboard tubes stuffed with even more cardboard tubes and cardboard tubes made into rabbit treat balls went down well, so next on the agenda is toilet roll inner tubes turned in to hay parcels.

No scissors necessary this time, you just need a cardboard toilet or kitchen roll tube and some tasty hay. You can also optionally add a little of your rabbit’s dry food or some vegetables. I guess fresh grass would work well too but it’s still a bit early in the year for that to be sprouting much.

Here’s what you do…

Start with a toilet roll or kitchen roll cardboard inner tube

Push the edge of the cardboard tube with your thumbs until it folds inwards.

It should look like this!

Rotate the tube and do the same to the opposite side to block the end.

Add your choosen filling.

Push in the sides as you did with the first end to seal it up

Finally give the hay parcel to you bunny. I made a slight technical error at this point, I gave Scamp the hay parcel and then found the camera batteries had gone flat. There was just a few wisps of hay left once they had charged so you’ll have to imagine the photo of him eating it or perhaps you could email me one of your bunny having fun with cardboard tubes? I’d love to see them.

Bunny Fun in the Snow!

Tamsin — Tue, 21 Dec 2010 02:45:07 +0000

No, I haven’t turfed Scamp outside in the cold. Not that I think he’d mind but I don’t fancy playing catch the rabbit in wellies. Instead I brought the snow to Scamp. I emptied out his digging box (usually filled with paper) and filled it with snow instead. I did the same thing last year and I think he remembered it because he was straight in and digging as soon as I put it down and had half the snow across the floor by the time I got the camera on.

It’s great enrichment for him and snow is great for digging. It’s slightly less messy that soil, though in hindsight perhaps a towel underneath would be a good idea. I didn’t think he’d get quite so energetic about throwing the snow around!

Here’s a video…

And some photos…

Of course after all the digging he needed a cuddle to dry his toes off. Actually, rabbit’s fur is pretty amazing stuff. All that mucking about in the snow and his toes, and the rest of him, weren’t cold at all.

More Cardboard Tube Toys (Part 2)

Tamsin — Thu, 09 Dec 2010 02:07:10 +0000

The first toilet roll rabbit toys went down well i.e. Scamp had fun destroying them. So, I thought we’d have a go at the cardboard balls that Schuette suggested. Scamp loves his treat ball and destroying things so they look like the perfect toy for him.

First thing you do is chop the toilet roll tube (or kitchen roll) into slices about a centimetre (half an inch) across to make hoops.

I found each toilet roll made about 6/7 hoops and that was about right to make one ball.

Once you have your sections you push one over another, then another over those two, overlapping them at different angles to cover the gaps until you have a ball. At some point before the gaps get too small (usually the 2-3 hoop mark) you pop in something tasty. I started with pellets but found they fell out as soon as Scamp made a little hole so moved on to pieces of carrot and cabbage leaf.

Once you’ve got all the hoops added they should look something like this:

Finally you add a rabbit and it ends up looking like confetti!

Here’s a video of him enjoy them too. Thank you very much for the idea! We’ll be trying hay stuffed tubes next .. I think I’ll wait until just before cleaning time because I can see Scamp getting hay everywhere!

More Rabbit Toys: Paper Tunnels

Tamsin — Fri, 01 Oct 2010 23:49:29 +0000

Left: Free newspaper tunnel, right: £6.99 cardboard rabbit tunnel (chewed)

I’ve been experimenting with tunnels for Scamp, here is a really easy to make newspaper tunnel….

Step 1: Lay out a row of sheets of newspaper, overlapping each sheet by approximately a third. I used 4 sheets.

Step 2: Roll the paper around something round, such as a cake tin. I use a shop brought tunnel.

Step 3: Roll over the ends to stop the tunnel unravelling. Fold outwards, like turning up trousers. You only need to fold over about an inch, do it twice to keep it secure.

That’s it – you should have a rabbit tunnel, as demonstrated by Scamp:

"Do I have too?" "Okay, but I'm going to pull a funny face."

Of course, it’s easy to chew to pieces but it’s quick and free to make so shredding is just part of the fun. I used a local paper but if you pick something bigger like the telegraph you could get a lovely long tunnel.

"Hi, can I have treats now?"

Enrichment Illustration

Tamsin — Fri, 22 Jan 2010 22:46:32 +0000

Here’s my rabbit picture for this week, an illustration of enrichment (making your bunnies environment interesting) for some info I’m writing.

Anyone else draw/painted/created any bunnies this week?

Scamp in the Snow

Tamsin — Mon, 21 Dec 2009 18:38:03 +0000

Snow is a great enrichment opportunity for rabbits to dig and forage; but, my garden is not Scamp proof. So, if the bunny can’t go to the snow, the snow has to come to the bunny. Cue one washing up bowl full of snow, laced with rabbit food…