Flatten Her World
An elderly rabbit's enclosure should gradually become a bungalow. Steep ramps between hutch levels are usually the first feature to defeat arthritic hips and weakening hind legs, and a rabbit who stops climbing has silently lost half her home. Where you can, rearrange her living space onto one level — a pen or a single-storey hutch with a generous footprint serves an old rabbit better than a tall, tiered one. If a slope is unavoidable, make it long and gentle rather than short and steep, carpet it or fix slats across it for grip, and watch her use it: a ramp she approaches and abandons is a ramp that has already become too much. The same applies to the step into and out of her sleeping box — lower it, or give her a bed at floor level so rest never requires a climb.
The Litter Tray: Lowest Door Wins
High-sided litter trays are a quiet crisis for stiff rabbits: hopping in demands exactly the hind-leg lift that arthritis removes, and rabbits who cannot manage it start toileting wherever they stand. Choose a tray with one genuinely low side, or cut an entry notch into one side of a sturdy tray and smooth the edge so she can walk in rather than jump. Keep the litter layer inside shallow near the entry so she is not wading uphill, and position the tray where she already prefers to go rather than expecting her to cross the whole pen for it. If she uses a corner of the room during free-roam time, a second low-entry tray there saves her the long hop back. Getting the tray right protects her skin as well as her dignity — an old rabbit sitting in damp bedding because the tray defeated her is at risk of a sore, wet underside.
Grip, Warmth and Sore Hocks
Slick floors — laminate, tiles, bare hutch boards — are hard going for back feet that no longer grip, and rabbits who splay and scramble lose confidence in moving at all. Lay washable runners, mats or low-pile rugs along her main routes: tray to hay, hay to bed, bed to water. Soft, dry footing matters doubly for her hocks, the point of the back foot that takes her weight at rest; elderly, heavier or less mobile rabbits wear the fur there thin and can develop sore, red hocks on hard or damp surfaces. Deep, soft bedding in her resting area, changed before it gets damp, is joint care as much as housekeeping. Hay belongs at floor level in a pile or a low rack she can eat from sitting down, and a heavy ceramic water bowl on the floor spares a stiff neck the reach up to a bottle spout.
Small Comforts, and When to Ask the Vet
Round the changes off with the details: a hide she can enter without ducking under a high lip, food and a favourite herb placed to reward short walks, and everything she needs within one unhurried circuit of her space. Then watch the results — an elderly rabbit using her whole enclosure again, choosing spots rather than camping in one corner, is the proof the changes fit. Contact your vet if she stops using the tray despite the low entry, sits hunched and grinds her teeth, goes off her hay, or develops a wet or sore underside, because rabbits hide pain well and a rabbit who is not eating needs help quickly. Keeping photos and notes of her final layout in KinsLe's Family Sharing profile means anyone who cleans, feeds or rabbit-sits her rebuilds the same low, grippy, single-level world her old joints depend on.