Homemade Toys to Keep a Rabbit Busy

In this guide

Bored rabbits chew furniture, dig at carpets and can become withdrawn. Toys are not a luxury for them, they are how a rabbit works off energy and keeps its mind active. The good news is that most rabbit toys can be made at home for free.

Chew and dig toys

• Empty toilet or kitchen roll tubes, stuffed loosely with hay, make an instant chew toy.
• A cardboard box filled with shredded paper becomes a digging box that saves the carpet.
• Untreated coconut coir doormats give rabbits a satisfying surface to dig at.
• Willow twigs, sun-dried and free of pesticide, are a reliably safe option for gnawing and good for teeth. Stick to known safe woods such as willow, apple or banana stem, since many commonly available Indian trees have not been studied for safety and are best avoided as chew items.

Hideouts and tunnels

Cut two openings into a medium cardboard box and it becomes a hideout most rabbits use immediately. Several boxes taped end to end make a tunnel system that costs nothing and can be rearranged whenever the rabbit seems to lose interest in the old layout.

Foraging toys

Rabbits enjoy working for their food. Scatter a portion of the daily pellet ration inside a rolled-up towel, or hide small pieces of vegetable inside a paper bag stuffed with hay, and let the rabbit dig it out. This mimics natural foraging behaviour and slows down rabbits that tend to eat too fast.

Toys from the kitchen

Vegetable offcuts that are already safe for rabbits to eat double as enrichment. Carrot tops, the outer leaves of cabbage, and coriander stems can be threaded onto a piece of jute string and hung at nose height for the rabbit to tug and nibble. Empty coconut shells, cleaned and dried, make a sturdy natural chew toy.

Rotating toys to hold interest

Rabbits, like most intelligent animals, get bored of the same toy after a while. Keep three or four toys in circulation and swap one out every few days rather than leaving everything in the enclosure permanently. A toy that has been away for a week usually gets investigated all over again as if it were new.

A word of caution

Check homemade toys regularly for small parts that could be swallowed, and remove anything with tape, staples or glue still attached before giving it to your rabbit.

Article content © Ravi Teja. All rights reserved.