Green Pee Litter Box II (for rabbits)

I gave up on the Green Pee system once. I figured out dry is the way to go and you can throw away the trash when and how much you want.

I tried different dry litter and finally back to square one, the high quality plain white paper litter, that expands 3X. I had been running away from it since day one. It's about the most expensive type commonly available. I tried most others. Now my bunny is a bit old to clean himself thoroughly so I have little choice.

The problem is, the litter box is so good that he sleeps in it too. And pee outside the box. And since he can't keep his feet dry outside the box, he pee inside the litter box too.

It's not lack of training or he is hard to train. When he was a baby he just pee on the tiny corner litter box. He kept going when he was a lot bigger, even when the box can barely allow him to sit down.

Now we just want to make it comfortable in every way, and now he lives indoor.

We just can't have his "cage" all covered with expensive litter. And how to clean it? He pees like a facuet.

So we went back to the Green Pee system and see what we can improve. Gravel is less messy if he pees and sleeps in the same place. And we can surely afford to cover the whole cage with gravel.

Now it looks like this. The litter box is two simplest cat litter box stacked together. The top one has some small holes at the bottom for drainage. The bottom hold any liquid passes from the top. The top litter box has inside it a layer of aquirum gravel, or substrate. On top of the gravel is a screen to reduce dirt or pills to get into the gravel. We use solar type screen for patio screen doors, which has a thick plastic coating on the screen wires.

Bunnies like gravel. Given the chance he will dig a shallow depression and hug his body in it. But earth and sand are similar. Just that gravel is easy to clean. Cool too.

My previous mistakes include thinking that the gravel must be completely dry before next use. For this 2nd version, the bottom box is taken away for the gravel to drain through the holes after rinsing. After overnight draining and an hour or two under the sun, the top gravel will be very dry and comfortable. Here we don't worry about humidity.  If the gravel isn't that deep, almost all will be dry except for some on the bottom.

Last time I used pea gravel from gardening stores. They are bigger and less comfortable to sleep on. The sizes of gravels vary a lot. Indeed I use a sieve to collect smaller gravel for the litter box.

Aqurium gravel or substrate are much finer. Some are not a lot bigger than a grain of sand. It's a lot more expensive than pea gravel but you don't need that much. About 10 lb for a litter box.

Some still wet gravel on the bottom doesn't matter, as long as you don't turn over the gravel. In version two, the gravel drains and drys in the litter box. Once done the litter box is put back for use plus the bottom box to hold any liquid. The gravels aren't moved once the top are dry.

Acquarium gravel seems to dry faster. Because it's finer, you don't need that much.

The other mistake is thinking that you need something to absorb the pee. The pee can stay on the bottom of the gravel, and held by the bottom box. So the system is very simple. But you need to clean up everyday, which is rather simple. You can also put something at the bottom to absort the pee, like kitchen towel and baking soda.

I thought cleaning was easy after soaking in some powerful solution overnight. It was the other way round. The more soak, the more is the time wasted for drying. And it is messy.

Now the cleaning is just take away the top screen. Rinse the gravel in the litter box. Pour away the floating dirt. Rinse the bottom box.

It's seems that the gravel are lighter so it's easy to rinse clean. And you don't need that much to be comfortable to sleep on and hold enough pee under.

The screen can be cleaned using thin jet patterns coming out of a garden hose.

I clean everyday and have two litter box system for rotation. I can have 3 if needed, less than $10 each.

The problem of washing is that rabbit poop is top fertilizer but attracts flies. So unless you have some sort of draining pit outdoor that flies cannot get to, you need to deal with the waste water. I have a big outdoor laundry tub and I can wash things in it.