Thinking about getting missleelovesbikestoo a rabbit for Christmas, but weighing up the practicalities. We'd both love a dog but that can't happen.

– We're both out from 7am to 5pm; It's a 3rd floor flat; No other pets or kids around.

+ Missllbt has owned cats in the past; We're both very caring and expect a bit of work every day to keep it clean and healthy; No other pets or kids around.

Is it unfair to keep a pet rabbit in a flat?
Should I look at a bonded pair?
How much bedding/floor material should I expect to go through in a week?
FTR looking at SSPCA rabbits that need rehoused, not Gumtree!

Is it unfair to keep a pet rabbit in a flat?

It's probably the fairest place to keep a pet rabbit imo.

It is a fact, that rabbits are Britain's most neglected pets. After about the the first week or two, when all the excitement of having a new pet has expired, rabbits are invariably left to starve, soaked in their own piss at the bottom of the garden.

At least in a flat, it reduces those possibilities.

They taste lovely in a pie

They do indeed Captain. I once got served a rabbit kebab…

We had a house bunny for several years. It was quite easy to erm.. toilet train him and he could be left to roam the house alone although I wouldn't advise that until you've had him for a while and figured out what he likes to sniff/chew.

All in all he seemed to make a good indoor pet.. although our broadband was instantly disconnected about a dozen times during his " training phase".

Oh, and if you get a boy bunny it really is er " kindest" to get his knackered chopped off..

Easy to skin and quite a lot of meat. Recommend wrapping in streaky bacon if roasting as the meat can be dry.

Pinot Grigio or New World chardonnay to accompany.

HTH

DS

I used to have a rabbit in my old house, great little thing, taught it to come over for strokes and play with it's little football, you just have to be careful when you let it out as they seem to like eating wallpaper and skirting boards, a lot easier to look after than cats/dogs etc just make sure you clean them out very regularly as after a few days they get a bit smelly and can have issues with attracting flies etc.
overall go for it

In th epie burn the useless chav.
Now in tomato sauce with pepper
yuuuuuuummmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy

Is it unfair to keep a pet rabbit in a flat?

Have you considered how you'll deal with the blighter once it pops its little clogs? Presumably you've got a rubbish chute or something similar 😉

lol @ juan. You're so French.

Flashheart, you're a chav ………… in a pie indeed 😯

Listen to the Frenchman ……… he knows what he's talking about

@ Slugwasg: Toilet and big prodding stick. Job's a gud'un.

we got 2 recently. If you read the bumf, keeping them in standard hutches is cruel, so you need to think about a bigger space and you've no garden presumably? House trained rabbits is your answer maybe?

Ours lives semi wild in the back garden, too cruel to keep it in a hutch/run. Collecting up it's 'doings' is a bit of a ball ache though.

Yes, a house-trained house rabbit. Lop-eared are the ones I believe?

It could roam the flat; We'll be doing some cable-munching prevention as well, don't want the little bugger fricasseed.

We have 3.
2 in the house roaming free in the lounge/hall all day and hall at night.
1 in the garage as he's a bit too aggressive so not bothering to try and introduce them as he was rescued off the road.

Don't expect to get one that likes being petted. Some do but most aren't keen and prefer to do their own thing.

PITA if you want to go away as you need someone to feed them. If it's a week and not too hot in the flat you can leave them without being cleaned out. Longer than that and you need someone to clean out bedding and litter trays.
PITA for dragging stuff all over the place so you need to hoover every other day if you want it slightly clean (unless they are caged most of the time).
PITA when they molt.
They only want to know you when they think food is involved or it actually bonds with you which is rare if your not in all day everyday.
Our 2 fell out when one was in the vets for a week and nearly made us miss a 2nd holiday because of them as they were too busy fighting due to the invasion of a "new" rabbit. They are sisters and never been apart other than 2 vet stays.

Oh yes vet bills not horrendous but more money out the door.

We used to have rabbits in a hutch and a massive run in the garden, but they take a lot of care for little "out". I have a friend with a house rabbit, it it much more interactive and lives in a much smaller hutch, but gets to run the flat during the evenings. Personally can't imagine having them running the house leaving little berries everywhere.

Ours lives semi wild in the back garden, too cruel to keep it in a hutch/run.

Not really, ours always hated being out in the garden (we have passing hawks) and would just sit in a corner together.

It could roam the flat; We'll be doing some cable-munching prevention as well, don't want the little bugger fricasseed.

Ours have chewed through electric heater cables while the heater has been on.

The only way to rabbit proof cables is to not have any or ensure the rabbit can't get to them. Extra outers don't stop them.

My children have a rabbit each, they have lost interest in them now left to me and the wife to look after – I feed them the wife cleans them out 😉

i dont know about different breeds but i read that most rabbits kept are really not happy as they would normally roam "quote" like a cat and cover the same distance i.e the length of your street. there for a hutch and less so a flat with no garden is cruel in my eyes.
just get a hamster and be done with it!

My cats eat rabbits. I love coming home to bunny parts on the carpet.

I am surprised there are no smutty 'rampant' innuendos flying around yet.

Be aware a properly cared for house rabbit stands a good chance of living a long time , our's died earlier this year at the grand old age of 13 and 2 months , we'd had him from 6 weeks old.He was an old English/lop cross and extremely affectionate to the point of jumping onto our knees to be fussed

A single bunny is more likely to bond with you than a pair (who will bond with each other)
A cage around 4' x 2' should be used as a minimum spacewise.
Cleaning poo's off the floor is easy with a vacuum so no worrys there but get a corner toilet tray for inside the cage as it makes cleaning up easier and makes the hay/sawdust go further(we got through a large sawdust every 6 weeks@£4 each and a hay every 2 weeks @£3 each)

House rabbits make fantastic pets and we'd have another one in a shot.

…just remember that not all bunnies are 'cuddly'. We adopted 'Oscar' and learned that rabbits can bark like a dog and have very sharp teeth!

It's taken a good few months but I can now pick him up without having to wear leather gardening gloves. And he lasted 30sec before nipping through the phone line when he was let loose in the front room. (he's a year old and now sans 'nads but it didn't seem to calm him down much!).

He does like his big outdoor run though (they have lots of energy and need plenty of exercise) and he's very good about using a 'potty' in his cage…

Amaze your friends and family by pointing out they aren't rodents… (they're lagomorphs aparently)

We have one, he's a bit of a monster. We're probably a bit cruel to him now. He used to have the run of the garden all the time but since we got a dog there have been 'incidents' so he's locked in his hutch for his own safety but we let him out three or four times a week, probably not often enough for long enough. When he is out though he just hides himself in a corner and sits there, almost certainly because he's shit scared of being attacked by a dog.

He used to be so happy too, wandering about the garden crapping everywhere, shagging cats and biting the wife.

I'd suggest guinea pigs instead – they're way more fun! 🙂

tick

I have a house bunny in a 3rd floor flat and must reply to this tonight! Have to go to work now though.

Damn, samuri, how big is that rabbit?

We have a boy rabbit, not had his bits chopped.

He lives in the kitchen, really enjoys being stroked and gets on very well with our 1 year old. He has the run of the garden when we are home and has a conservatory with a variety of boxes to chew and climb in and over.

Very clean, does everything in the hutch, but does make the house smell of rabbit.

Not sure about a rabbit in a flat, as ours really enjoys going outside, runs and jumps about sniffing all the smells and eating the grass and flowers etc when he gets released.

This thread has (almost) made me want to get another one!

Spend loads of time lying on the floor interacting on the rabbit's own level – much less scary for them at the beginning.
The more effort you put in at first, getting to know the thing, allowing it to approach you on it's own terms, the more tolerant of human contact it will be when it gets older.

It WILL strip the paper off your walls and chew your cables (Rega turntable in my case – how much to replace???).

They prefer spinach to carrots, go absolutely crazy for it.

Dylan is a good name. 🙂

(EDIT) Used to love eating rabbit when young, often shot by myself or mates on lamping expeditions to local north Manchester Golf clubs and parks. After having one as a pet, just can't bring myself to eat it any more. Soft or what?

I'm gonna watch Watership Down this weekend.

Sniff.

>Talk to me about rabbits<

Nice to eat and can be cooked in a number of ways. Why not buy a few and with a little effort make yourself a nice Ushanka with the pelts.

Can't see the attraction in caging one up as a pet tbh…

All pets are a pain in the bum, Tinsetta and the children's rabbits live in the garden, they need hutches cleaning constantly (my job), they happily roam the garden during the day but are a pain to catch at night, and too angry for the kids to safely get out of the hutch in the morning, don't mind a bit of petting once you have caught them mind you… One is constantly trying to get into the kitchen and if it chews on the wires behind the washing machine any more it will get a big 240v surprise..

We bought some tortoises (against my will) that are now pretty much ignored by everyone except me, who has to feed them and put them into their run every day, the indoor run thing is a constant battle to stop smelling as tortoises do a disproportionate sized dump given their size, and give zero love back… (but at least I can catch the feckers)

Man up and say no, give her a baby, or just trade her in for a new one. 🙂

Nice thread :). Yes, they can make good pets, especially if left to roam free – the number of rabbits being "garage ornaments" only checked on once a week are fortunately reducing!

[Sensible hat on]BIG thing with rabbits is their diet, and the effect it has on body weight on tooth growth. You should make sure they've always got access to fresh grass/hay/straw – that's what they're designed to live on. "Rabbit food" is necessary but should be looked on as a supplement. Get the homogeneous stuff like burgess supa excel(not the mix – they're buggers for hunting out all the sweet tasty stuff and leaving the beneficial high fibre goodies) and limit greens/fruit to occasional treats. Rabbits teeth grow constantly and if you don't get their diet right the teeth can grow wonkey, leading to regular vet trips to have them clipped/burred down again and a much shorter life span. Also, overweight rabbits are much more prone do disease and can't keep themselves clean.

Personally, I prefer Guinea Pigs though – more character 😉

Man up and say no, give her a baby

Woah, steady on. I said we live top floor and are out from 7-5.

Bunnies are fabulous pets but make sure you get the breed that is right for you. If you like being close to a furry friend then i would suggest looking at the lop breeds but particularly mini lops and dwarf/holland lops or lion haired lops. The Polish lops are sometimes more aggressive. We had a fabulous house dwarf lop who was litter trained and very very affectionate. He would follow me around int eh mornings and play chase in teh garden. Being a boy, he loved to be in the garage with all the bikes and tools and would wait in front of the door to be let in!
He would come and greet us in bed in the mornings and just loved cuddles. He tolerted being picked up but i think generally as a rule bunnies love being cuddled and stroked while they are on the ground and you're at their level. A water squirter is an excellent training tool for anti chewing of your stuff but there are lots of tips to top them from chewing what you want to be kept intact like phone wires etc.
Good luck. They are lovely little friends :o)

Lee, he's fairly hefty. 😉

Awwwwwwww

Got two female rabbits that have the run of the garden. They have a hutch to sleep in but are never confined there. Seem healthy and happy enough. Go to the vets twice a year for mixy jabs (we live in a mixy blackspot)and they are always complemented on their condition. Some good points above though. They are not overly keen on being petted, the veg patch now looks like a POW camp with all the wire and stuff but on the plus side I've not had to mow the back lawn for a couple of years now. Not sure I'd be too happy leaving them in doors though. Wires can be very chewy…

just get a hamster and be done with it!

Hamsters and whatsitpigs are both roamers too with large natural habitats, if you want to take that route you basically can't keep any animal without a large garden.