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The subject of intentional breeding or meat rabbits is prohibited. The answers provided on this board are for general guideline purposes only. The information is not intended to diagnose or treat your pet. It is your responsibility to assess the information being given and seek professional advice/second opinion from your veterinarian and/or qualified behaviorist.

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BUNNY 911 – If your rabbit hasn’t eaten or pooped in 12-24 hours, call a vet immediately!  Don’t have a vet? Check out VET RESOURCES 

The subject of intentional breeding or meat rabbits is prohibited. The answers provided on this board are for general guideline purposes only. The information is not intended to diagnose or treat your pet.  It is your responsibility to assess the information being given and seek professional advice/second opinion from your veterinarian and/or qualified behaviorist.

BINKYBUNNY FORUMS

Forum BEHAVIOR Dog and bunny

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    • Bunnygirl25
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        How do I introduce a 4 month old puppy to rabbits?


      • KytKattin
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        1195 posts Send Private Message

          How big is the puppy going to be? How old are your bunnies? Are they spayed/neutered? Will the dog be spayed/neutered? (if the answer is no to those last two questions, don’t ever have the animals together unless they are!). How much training do you plan on doing with the dog? Have your bunnies been around dogs before?

          For instance, my 5lb chihuahua and 3lb rabbit get along fine, but the dog grew up with the bunny and I have put hours upon hours into training her. The most she does is steal hay (yes, hay O_o) from the rabbit. She views the rabbit as part of her pack, and doesn’t have a prey drive towards anything but birds.


        • Elrohwen
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          7318 posts Send Private Message

            The most important thing is to go slow and make sure both the dog and bunny are calm. With a young pup you need to worry about play more than prey drive – the puppy will probably want to pounce on the rabbit and make it play with him, but obviously that’s not appropriate behavior with rabbits. Keep the puppy on leash and praise when he’s calm and quiet around the bunnies. Don’t let the puppy off leash around rabbits until he’s older and well trained and even then only under supervision.


          • BridgetteBunny
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            20 posts Send Private Message

               I am currently introducing my 3 dogs to my new bunny.  I have always had dogs and rabbits together.  How much freedom/interaction you can allow depends a lot on the dogs and the bunny.  If your bunny is not fearful and is curious then you just have to work on your puppy.  My small dog is a 7lb min pin.  SHe has always been around bunnies and has helped me foster several.  She is also ten years old so is not overly playful.  WIth her i just introduced her on leash and set up boundaries so that my dog knows she can’t go in She-ra’s (my bunny) cage.  She can go in the pen and the room and all and she sits with the bunny and goes in her hidey hold but if She-ra wants a break she knows she can go into her crate and my dog won’t go in their.  I just did that by keeping the dog on leash and correcting her gently with my voice and tension on the leash if she went in the crate.  My big dogs know the bunny is on look but don’t touch status.  They are younger and bigger so I don’t allow them direct contact.  We play a game called “Look at That” in which the dogs get rewarded for looking at She-ra and staying calm.  I click their look and then when they turn back to me they get a treat.  We are still playing that game around her mostly but the idea is that by rewarding them for staying calm and looking then looking away, they learn to stay calm.  Its also a game for them so they have something else to do besides just staring at the bunny and waiting for her to move.  Give it a try and let us know how it goes!

               

              -Lindsay


            • HoneysBuns
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                 I recently went hrough this when I brought home an abandoned American Bulldog puppy. I had already introduced my other two older  dogs to rabbits, but this was a puppy so I was glad to have the opportunity to raise her with the rabbits. To start, I put my puppy in the crate (also for crate training, you should highly consider this when training a puppy, it makes everything easier!) and let my rabbits come up and sniff her through the bars. I chose to do this during one of her puppy naps so she wouldn’t scare them at all. 

                After having them approach her for awhile while she was contained, I decided to put them in an xpen and let her walk around from the outside of the  pen and watch them. Whenever she barked or went into the play bow or showed any form of excitement, I would remove her. I would also work on training her “down” so that she learned to get on the ground when the buns were around. At this point she was still very small, only about 20 lbs or so, so I began to feel comfortable letting her in the same area as the rabbits when she was showing non-threatening interest, while keeping her in a “down stay”. She was so small then, that my mini lop would actually charge her and honk sometimes! He never did that with my other dogs but thought this little one was a formidable opponent! Now I trust her with them, the buns jump all over her and she just accepts it, haha. The only thing I have to worry about is when she uses her nose to push them to the side, because she loves eating their poops! (the vet tells me this isn’t desirabe obviously, but won’t harm the dog). Now she just plops down in front of their area and watches them when she’s bored, like bunny tv!
                Good luck with your introductions!
                 
                Here is Honey and bridge bun Tuna
                 

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            Forum BEHAVIOR Dog and bunny