How to Potty Train Your Rabbit

Hey, bunny guys! Today I’m going to tell you how to litter train your rabbit. Before you start, there are a couple of things you’ll need to ensure:

Make sure you have a large cat-sized litter box. Small litter boxes made for rabbits and small animals are way too small, and most rabbits won’t use them because of their size.

A large cat-sized litter box is usually perfect, depending on the size of your rabbit. Another essential item you’ll need is safe litter for the litter box. I personally recommend using pine pellets, such as feline pine wood stove pellets without accelerants, and horse stall pellets. Lastly, you’ll want to spay or neuter your rabbit. You can try to start litter training before your rabbit is spayed or neutered; however, their hormones make it extremely hard for them to stay litter trained because they tend to mark all the time if they are not fixed.

Step-by-Step Guide to Litter Training Your Rabbit

Step One: Place the Litter Box Correctly

Step one is to place the litter box in the corner of the cage where your rabbit likes to go to the bathroom. If you’ve observed your rabbit at all, you probably noticed that they tend to pee and poop mostly in one or two corners of their cage. This is because rabbits really like to scoot their butt back into a corner to pee or poop, so placing your litter box in the corner is the best place.

If you’re not sure which corner your rabbit likes to use, just kind of guess. If you find out it’s a different corner, either move it over there or add another litter box in that corner. If your rabbit tries to push the litter box away from the corner and go on the floor behind it, just use some zip ties. Poke a hole through your litter box and zip tie the litter box to the cage. Alternatively, you can zip tie just a giant loop and then dog leash clip the zip tie to the cage so that you can take the litter box in and out for easy cleaning. You can also read how to bunny proof your home.

Step Two: Add Hay to the Litter Box

Step two is to place your rabbit’s hay above the litter box in a hay rack or at the far end of the litter box. This is because rabbits naturally eat and poop at the same time, so placing the hay in the litter box really helps teach your rabbit that that is where they’re supposed to go.

Make sure your rabbit can’t access the hay outside of the litter box; otherwise, you might find your rabbit just sitting on the outside of the litter box, chewing the hay, and using the floor as the bathroom. You can also read how to care for a pet rabbit indoors.

Step Three: Clean Up Accidents Promptly

Step three is to clean up any accidents that do happen by sweeping up the poops and dumping them back into the litter box or wiping up pee with a paper towel and placing part of that paper towel into the litter box so your rabbit can smell that’s where they’re supposed to go.

Then clean the floor with vinegar and water to help remove any smells, and I would consider doing this at least twice daily. You can read my another article how to stop rabbit pooping everywhere.

Tips for Successful Rabbit Potty Training

Keep absorbent material outside of the cage

Some extra tips I’m going to leave you guys with is to keep absorbent material outside of the cage until they are litter trained. Anything like fleeces, towels, cardboard, anything that is absorbent, just keep that out of the cage until they are using their litter box fairly consistently.

That’s because rabbits tend to also want to go to the bathroom where there’s absorbent material just because they find it cleaner and easier. Keep any cardboard or towels or anything like that out of the cage until your rabbit is more reliably litter trained.

Keep your cage small

The next tip is to keep your cage small. When I say this, I don’t mean smaller than the recommended size for a rabbit, but don’t let your rabbit have an entire room right away. The more space they have, the harder it is for them to understand the concept of litter training. So for the first week or so, just keep them in their normal cage or whatever you may find. Every time you expand the cage, you may find that there is a little bit of territorial pooping or peeing going on. That is just kind of a normal rabbit thing that is going to happen, so just be aware of that. Keep practicing the tips I mentioned earlier, and it should go away soon.

Conclusion: Be Patient and Consistent

Last but not least, please remember that rabbits are not perfect. They will have accidents from time to time, and some rabbits are just very, very stubborn and don’t wish to be litter trained. Most of the time, you can get a rabbit to consistently, for the most part, use a litter box; however, they do have a stubborn streak in them, and if they get mad or something, they’ll just pee on the floor for a random reason. Some of my bunnies have been excellent and never peed outside the litter box barely a day in their life, and then I have others which will do it almost once daily, consistently. It definitely depends on your rabbit and their personality on how easy this is going to be for you. Just be consistent and keep up with these tips, and you should have a semi-litter-trained rabbit very soon.