our pet rabbit

Question
We recently got a bunny and we have 2 daughters 8/11 yrs. old.  We keep "thumper" in our basement in a cage about 4ft square. She's a little white angora. The girls love to hold her and let her hop around and when they clean her cage and put their hands in to fill her food dish or pat her she started biting them.  She chews on everything we keep an empty box in her cage or a paper towel roll so she can chew on that.  Should we not put the cardboard in her cage? Is that encouraging her to chew? How can we get her to not bite the girls when they just want to pat her?  Thanks!!

Answer
The bunny is telling you that the cage is her space, so you need to redirect her to other behaviors and get her out of the cage while being cleaned.

You can put a plain brown cardboard box in the cage, or an old phonebook.  Rabbits love to chew and it's good to encourage her in this behavior.

I know your girls are a bit old for this, but the principles apply especially in the section "Teaching Children to be Rabbit People" at http://www.rabbit.org/faq/sections/children.html

Kim