Mental stimulation. Without challenging activities to
occupy your rabbit when you're not home, your rabbit,
especially a solitary rabbit, will get bored. This could lead
to depression and/or excessive destruction. The creative use
of toys can extend your rabbit's life by keeping him
interested in his surroundings, by giving him the freedom to
interact with those surroundings, and by allowing him to
constantly learn and grow.
Physical exercise. Your rabbit needs safe activities to
keep her body in shape as well as her mind. She needs things
to climb on, crawl under, hop on and around, dig into, and
chew on. Without outlets for these physical needs, your
rabbit may become fat or depressed, or may create jumping,
chewing, or crawling diversions with your furniture.
Bunny proofing for your home. As is clear from the above
descriptions, toys are not just for your rabbit, they also
keep your house safe. By providing your rabbit with a
selection of toys chosen to meet her age, sex, reproductive
status and temperament, you have fulfilled most of the
requirements of bunnyproofing your home.
If you find your rabbit ingesting plastic or cardboard toys, switch to a different type of toy that the rabbit is not interested in eating.
Some good toys to start with:
Paper Bags and Cardboard boxes for crawling inside, scratching,
and chewing. Bunnies like them much more when there are at least
two entry points into the boxes. Chris Rosenzweig has some
Great Tips on Building Bunny Box Toys
Cardboard concrete forms for burrowing
Cardboard roll from paper towels or toilet paper
Untreated wicker baskets or boxes full of: shredded paper,
junk mail, magazines, straw, or other organic materials for
digging
Yellow Pages for shredding
Cat toys: Batta balls, and other cat toys that roll or can
be tossed
Parrot toys that can be tossed, or hung from the top of the
cage and chewed or hit
Baby toys: hard plastic (not teething) toys like rattles
and keys, things that can be tossed
Children's or birds' mobiles for hitting
"Lazy cat lodge" (cardboard box with ramps and windows) to
climb in and chew on. Also, kitty condos, tubes, tunnels,
and trees
Nudge and roll toys like large rubber balls, empty Quaker
Oat boxes and small tins
Toys with ramps and lookouts for climbing and viewing the
world
Dried out pine cones
Jungle gym type toys from Toys R Us
A (straw) whisk broom
A hand towel for bunching and scooting
Untreated wood, twigs and logs that have been aged for at
least 3 months. Aapple tree branches can be eaten fresh off
the tree. Stay away from: cherry, peach, apricot, plum and
redwood, which are all poisonous.
Untreated sea grass or maize mats from Pier One or Cost Plus
Things to jump up on (they like to be in high places)
Colorful, hard plastic caps from laundry detergent and softener
bottles. They have great edges for picking up with their teeth,
make a nice "ponk" sound when they collide, and the grip ridges
molded into the plastic make a neat "rachety" sound when rabbits
digs at the cap. The caps are nice for human-stacks-on-floor and
bun-knocks-down kind of games. Note: Be sure not to choose caps
from caustic material bottles (e.g.drain uncloggers, bathroom
cleaner bottles) since a residue of the cleaner might remain no
matter how much washing off you do.