Connect with your Rabbit – Fun Ideas

Our Bunny isn’t much into cuddling. He gives us about 15 minutes total every day and then he’s done. That’s not enough to build a relationship with anyone, though, so we came up with ways to connect with Bunny and strengthen our bond without cuddling him. Here are our favorite 5 ways to spend quality time with Bunny.

1. A Game of Tag
One of us humans will grab a bunch of food, such as parsley, and take it to one end of the house. Bunny automatically comes after us, because he heard the fridge door opening and closing and expects his obligatory treat. We make him stand on his hind legs and give him a tiny piece of the parsley before racing to the other side of the house and calling his name. Bunny hops after us and receives another tiny bite of parsley before we sprint to the next spot in the house and call his name. This goes on until Bunny decides that he had enough. Usually after 5-10 rounds. This is a great game, because it makes him and us run and spend time together interacting.

2. The Shell Game
Take 2-3 plastic cups (transparent for beginners), your bun’s favorite food, and sit down on the floor with your rabbit. We like to use any kind of herb for this. Place a piece the food inside the cups and put them upside down on the floor. Now encourage your bunny to get the treat out. You can play this over and over again. Make it more difficult by placing the cup on top of an elevated surface or set up 2-3 cups at once and only add the treat to one of them.

3. Hop
You may have seen the video before, but this game never gets old. We build a wall out of small cardboard boxes, such as the ones soda cans come in, and encourage Bunny to hop over them by repeating the word “hop” and holding a piece of his favorite food in front of him. He gets the exercise and we get to interact with him.

4. Roly-Poly
This game may sound strange, but trust me, it’s fun. We take an empty paper towel roll and place it on the floor standing upright. Bunny can never resist nudging it and throwing it down. He’ll hop by it nonchalantly, pretend he doesn’t care, and then quickly give it a nudge. Every time he does it, we put it back up and encourage him to throw it down again. It gets even better once you balance something light on top of the paper towel roll, such as one of the empty cardboard boxes soda cans come in.

5. Teach and Play
To bond with your rabbit, teach a new skill! We found that any rabbit toys that require a bit of thinking to get to the treat are great, because when Bunny first gets one of them, we sit down with him and teach him how to get to the treat. This takes anywhere from half an hour to several weeks (with a “lesson” once a day). That way, we get to spend time with him and he learns something new. Once he has mastered the skill, he can play with the toy on his own and we move on to something else. Any of the “SmartBunny” toys we will have in our shop will be good for this, but there are more out there.

In addition to these 5, Bunny loves to sit and watch TV with us and he also enjoys “helping” when one of us does the laundry, works on the laptop, or does some kind of craft while sitting on the floor. What do you do to connect with your rabbit?