If you are a rabbit owner, then you must be knowing how messy rabbits are. Cleaning their cage looks like a daunting task. So, we are here to help you with 5 simple tips that can make the cleaning work easy for you.
- Dividing the cleaning work into daily and weekly cleaning sessions.
- Make use of a DIY cleaning mixture.
- Drying the cage in the sun works wonders.
- Using a plastic cage is a better option.
- Make use of absorbent bedding.
Let’s dive a little bit deeper to learn about these tips in detail.
Daily Cleaning Sessions
It will be nice if you do a cleaning checkup on your rabbit’s cage daily. This will relieve you from the burden of doing the whole cleaning work all at once.
Litter Box cleaning is necessary
If you think you can clean your rabbit’s litter box once a week, believe me, it is a bad idea. The litter box will start smelling horrible, and the feces and urine will start sticking to the box as well as your rabbit.
So, it is better to clean the litter box daily. The longer you wait, situations will get messier. Read this guide on easy steps to set up a rabbit litter box the right way.
Clean the food bowl and fill it with new pellets
You should daily clean the food bowl of your rabbit and remove any pieces of old food before serving anything new.
It will ensure that your rabbit ingests hygienic and healthy food. Keep on serving the food without cleaning the previous one can cause stomach infections to your rabbit.
The water bottle should also be refreshed with new water
Removing old water, cleaning the water bottle, and restoring it with fresh water daily is a good habit. It will ensure that your rabbit drinks clean water and not something distasteful.
Vacuum the area around the cage
Sometimes, poop keeps on accumulating around the cage, making the place dirty and messy. It will help if you keep an eye on the area around the cage for anything dirty in such a case.
I’m not saying that you should vacuum the outer part of the cage daily, but vacuum it immediately whenever you see something messy. Otherwise, the pile of poop will keep getting bigger.
You will learn how to clean rabbit cages by watching this girl’s video:
Weekly Cleaning Checkups
Weekly cleanup is essential because it will not let any mold or bacteria harm your furry pal spread.
Washing toys and other playing things of your rabbit
Rabbits have a sensitive stomach, so you should pay special attention to everything they chew or play with. Washing their toys weekly will keep them safe from ingesting anything harmful.
Please don’t use any usual cleaner, only use a rabbit-safe cleaner that does not affect your rabbit’s health.
Washing the cloth bedding from time to time
If not washed weekly, the rabbit can ingest the fur leading to some digestion issues. So, to prevent any such thing from happening and get rid of any extra fur, change and wash your rabbit’s cloth bedding every week.
Cleaning the cage is essential
Once in a week, make it a habit to clean the whole rabbit’s cage with water or a rabbit-safe cleaner.
If not cleaned for a long time, the cage will start stinking, and urine can even be soaked by the cage material, making it unhygienic.
Disinfecting the cage
Due to the rabbit’s messy behaviour and its urine and poop, harmful molds and bacteria can develop inside the cage. They can make your rabbit sick which you don’t want.
Therefore, it is necessary to disinfect the cage when you clean it. For this, you can use the DIY solution that we will discuss further in this article or any other rabbit-safe solution.
Thorough cleaning of the food and water utensils
Every week, you should remove the utensils from the cage and put them into the dishwasher for thorough cleaning. This will prevent the spread of any mold and bacteria fatal for your rabbit.
The requirement to replace the litter
Sometimes, even after cleaning the litter box along with the cage regularly, the smell problem exists. Replacing the litter can help you solve this problem, and your rabbit will also have a fresh litter to sleep on.
DIV Rabbit-Friendly Cleaning Solution
Rabbits are susceptible to many products, so you need to be careful about the products you choose to clean the rabbit’s cage.
Most of the pet stores sell animal-friendly cleaning solutions. You can use those. But, with our simple DIY rabbit-safe cleaning solution, you don’t even need to visit a pet store.
Two ingredients are all you need to make the solution, i.e., water and vinegar.
You simply have to make a mixture of water and vinegar, and your cleaning solution will be ready. There is no such specific measurement to make the solution, but the 50:50 ratio is preferable.
However, if you or your rabbit do not like the smell of vinegar, you can make a solution of 25:75. For properly spreading the answer in the whole cage, you can use a spray bottle.
Sometimes, stains are harder to clean, and even the solution doesn’t seem to work on it. You can put some baking soda on the stain and spray some DIY solution on it in such a case. The fizzing will break the stain, and you can clean it off quickly.
Put The Cage In The Sun To Air Dry It
Sun rays are natural disinfectants and will clean any remaining harmful bacteria present in the cage. In addition to it, the sun rays will make the cage warm enough to make your rabbit feel comfier in it.
Usually, I hose the cage down and leave it in the sun to dry. While the cage is drying, my little brother and I play with our furry pal.
After playing, our little bunny gets tired and sleeps in the warm, cleaned cage comfortably. Watching our bunny sleep soundly makes us feel pleased too.
Choosing The Right Cage
If you are a new rabbit owner, then there are chances that you can get confused regarding which rabbit cage material you should choose.
Mostly, the choice is between the wood cage and the plastic one. For the ease of cleaning, plastic one will serve you the best.
If you are looking to go for a wood cage, it is a durable option. But, it is troublesome to clean. The main issue is, feces stick to wood, making the cleaning process difficult.
Water and urine can stain or absorb in the wood. The absorbing tendency of wood will make the cage stink, and bacteria build-up will also increase.
On the other hand, plastic is a better option than wood because it does not absorb any wet substances and is much easier to clean. The only issue with plastic is, it can get stained.
If you are irregular in cleaning the plastic cage, urine will stain the plastic, making it difficult to clean. However, the DIY solution that we suggested will make it easy for you to clean hard stains.
Bedding Selection
Bedding is an essential part of your rabbit’s cage. It makes your rabbit feel comfortable and does the work of absorbing the urine and other waste to prevent any unpleasant smell and stain.
Most of the rabbits feel happy and warm while sleeping on the bedding, and if the bedding is of grass, it will be nutritional too.
Many rabbits do not have the tendency even to use a litter box. Most of them mark their territory with their urine, while some poop and urine in their bedding only.
Placing proper bedding in the cage helps control the rabbit’s waste that does make it inside the litter box.
Rabbits have the natural tendency of chewing every other thing, even their bedding. So, you need to choose the rabbit’s bedding carefully as it should not be toxic.
- Straw: Cheaper option, but does not provide any type of nutritional value.
- Hay: Good option for nutritional value, but not good at absorbing liquids.
- Aspen wood shavings: As we know, wood is an excellent absorbent, so it will work well to absorb urine. You should bring it from a pet store instead of getting it directly from the lumber yard. It is because lumber yard wood shaving will not be sanitized and hence, not safe for use.
- Wood pellets: It is an expensive option compared to wood shavings. But it is an excellent absorbent for urine and odour.
- Blank paper: Convenient and easy option, but do not use paper with ink on it as ink can be toxic for rabbits.
- Brown paper bags: Another easy option, just like blank paper. All you have to do is tear it up and use it for burrowing.
- Cardboard: Works similar to paper bags. Just cut it into small pieces and use it as bedding for your furry friend.
- Old towels: An excellent option, but make sure your rabbit does not ingest ant strings while chewing it.
- Old sheets: Same as towels, just watch for strings.
- Old rug: Just like towels and sheets, it is also an excellent absorbent, but you have to take care of the strings.
When thoroughly cleaning the cage weekly, make sure that you remove the bedding, clean it, and replace it with a new one to prevent bacterial build-up and comfort your rabbit.
Conclusion
Regardless of the sort of rabbit cage you have, a few basic daily activities can make keeping your pet’s home much cleaner.
These chores will also help to avoid any odours from accumulating in your rabbit’s habitat, as well as bug infestations.
