Tuesday 5 March 2013

Building a Cheapo Rabbit Paradise


First thing I did was bugger up Unconsidered Trifles I.
It's in the kiln now, being bisque fired, along with various other pieces I've made... but now it is missing the top.

Lesson learnt... do not wait to sand and final finish piece till it is bone dry.

So... moving swiftly on, I cheered myself up with gnocchi and cheese, and then started work on bunny house improvements (Neil cleaned the little buggers out earlier, so I only had to do the exciting bits, woop!)
Monsoon, the black bunny on the left is threeish. We had to get Khamsin (on the right, she's the lop bunny, less than a year old) to replace Zephyr, Monsoon's sister, who died last year, because Twinkle, the black cat was getting confused about what species she was... she's coming up to a year old now, but at 6 months, she was pretty convinced she was a rabbit, and Monsoon was trying to bond with her. Cue new bunny.

They all seem to get on pretty well... as you can see, the bunny zone is so cool, the cat likes to play in there. Today I've had a rearrange of the stuff in their enclosure, moved the shelf round and built on another two levels with fruit boxes.
Twinkle is sat on the new levels - two banana boxes, taped together, filled with straw and newspaper with a hole cut underneath and on-top so they can get in and out. It's balanced on top of the big plastic base of the 'indoor rabbit cage', which is where they do most of their pooping, and all of their peeing - they have a litter tray in there for peeing in, and another in the corner (bottom of a hamster cage) for lying in and digging and generally chilling out. Un-neutered girl rabbits are supposed to be near impossible to a) introduce as adults and b) litter train. Either everybody is lying, or, like every other animal in this house, they're a bit odd, because Monsoon litter trained herself, then taught Khamsin!

The big pine box is a small reptile viv with the electrics and the glass removed (the lizard has a bigger one, now located in the kitchen, because he was bored) where they like to hide out, since we can't see in, or get into it easily. There is also an expensive blue bunny cave (rarely used) and a red kiddy step... which is their favourite thing. They've also got treat balls, where we sometimes put their dried food - or in the bamboo pipe, which can hold all kinds of stuff - it used to be a hamster bed.

The shelf Khamsin is sitting on is freestanding - it was originally part of a computer desk. They mostly use it to slide along (Khamsin), hide underneath (Monsoon), hop on and off, sneak up on the cat and chase one another round.
They're kept in their zone by imaginative use of plastic wire fencing and the wire cage bit of the indoor bunny cage, which is on the edge of the spare room bed to prevent escapees.
Mostly they eat hay, a couple of handfuls of dry food scattered all over (today I put it into the new boxes to get them excited about going in) and a cabbage, broccoli or carrots. Sliced veg was only 35p a bag when I went shopping tonight so they got extra - most of it dropped into the smaller cardboard boxes, which I bring home from work. They're pretty sturdy bisque boxes... but they get chomped into oblivion pretty quick!
We try to move the shelf and plastic shelters around and give them new stuff to explore every couple of weeks - they seem to be brainier than the dog (they can use a treat ball, he can't) and the more interesting we make their environment, the more fun they are to watch...

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