Hi, I’d like to ask for advice on the best material for litter in our bunny’s litter box.
He was doing great for the first 4 months we had him but after his neutering about 5 months ago he began to dig the litter out of his box. He will dig a clear spot out in one specific corner where he pees (which is what he’s doing in the photo). Then every time after that he pees on the bare plastic and stands in it since that’s right in front of the hay rack part of the litter box
Then he will sit on us and you can smell pee on him, and his paws will be wet. Pretty gross. Also, you can now smell pee in the area where his litter box is (in the room where the puppy play pen is), which you could not smell before since the pine pellets absorbed the pee). And the smell is despite a high-end air filter
I suspect he may not like the pine pellets we have been using since the start. It’s weird that he was fine with that as litter for many months. He will also sit outside his litter box / hay rack and pull the hay out of the side he can reach, which adds to my suspicion he has started to dislike the pine pellets. Given that he poops while he eats, we will find a few poops where he sits when he does that, but that’s not a big deal.
So my ideas are:
Switch to paper bedding. However, he loves to eat paper and cardboard so my worry is he will eat the bedding and it will clog his intestines and we end up with GI stasis. Also, I’ve read that paper bedding isn’t great for dealing with the smell of pee. And I know digging is instinctive so he may have just gotten into the habit of digging so the litter material may make no difference
Buy a new litter box that has a plastic grate and put a pee pad and pine nuggets underneath the grate. I’m wondering if the problem will only be marginally improved since it is still bare plastic so it will still cause him to be standing in pee, just less of it.
Any recommendations?
by MilesBFree