Guinness and Bleu Bonding Diary – Feedback Freely Welcomed (*Bonded!*)

[Sleepy]

I’ve posted a bit about them but Bleu and Guinness are finally on road to bonding. We’ve had to keep them separated due to being unfixed when we got them and lack of space to put both their x-pens beside each other, but we finally got the time and their hormones died down enough to let them meet. 

We’ve been doing some pre-bonding with things like swapping supplies and giving them stuffie friends with each other’s scent for the past while. Today was the first day we let them ‘see’ each other by putting them in the same play area but only through a gate.

Day 1-pre-bond meet:

We were really nervous since we hadn’t been able to do the approach of taking our first bun, Guinness, to a shelter to pick her partner. Especially since we’d be introducing Bleu into ‘her’ space (and, if things go well, Bleu would be moving into her pen in the kitchen so we can build them up to sharing rest of kitchen as free range). However, Guinness seemed enamored with Bleu from get go. She constantly seemed to follow him and even kept poking to him to give him kisses after he gave her a few. She even pulled his hay tunnel via the hay strands closer to the gate to get his attention, apparently, and has been binking around.

Bleu seemed more interested in his surroundings than Guinness, as he hasn’t been in the living room as often as Guinness, but he occasionally snuck to the gate after Guinness had been there and peaked at her. We’re not sure if it’s because he’s a shyer bun than Guinness or because of the new surroundings.

We’re tentatively hopeful but are aware this is still only the first ‘pre-meet’. Both seem comfortable lying down or grooming themselves despite other being around, at least. The tentative plan is if they continue to get along through gate for another day or two we’ll let them meet face-to-face in bath tube and see where it goes. 

[Gina.Jenny]

sounds promising

[Sleepy]

@Gina – We’re hoping so ^^. Don’t want to get hopes up too, too much yet until they’re sharing a space and getting along.

With that said,

Day 2 – Pre-bond meet:

Another hopeful day, with a few surprises and buns trying to give heart attacks. Night started off similar to previous night, with both buns following each other around a little and then shoving noses in for kisses before running off to do their own thing. Bleu managed to find his way under and into the couch, though (we think because couch was bun proofed for Guinness, who’s a larger bun then Bleu), through a hole and we had to spend a large chunk of time trying to get him out. Once he was out and calmed down, he flopped by the gate and Guinness gave him a few kisses before flopping down for a few seconds and then running off.

Still, Guinness was okay flopping by the gate in her own time and tried making a break to Bleu’s side via jumping gate. We quickly put her back to her side, since we want to make sure they have their first face-to-face in neutral ground, but we’re guessing she wants to really meet Bleu at least.

If things go well tomorrow, we’ll probably try giving them some bath tub time to meet face-to-face at the end of their out time.

[Sleepy]

Day 3 – First meet

Some positives and negatives: for negatives, Guinness was definitely more nippy with Bleu today, which could be for a lot of reasons (him not grooming her back; territorialness; etc.). Started getting worried because Bleu shoved his head over the gate and Guinness appeared to be getting a bit lungey, so kept sprayer on hand.

For positives: they were eating beside each other today and first official ‘date’ went well! Instead of the tub, we settled for a large box on the porch. We intended for the date to last between 5-10 minutes but it went to about 15 since Guinness decided she wanted to spend several moments grooming Bleu’s ears. There was some nipping from Bleu on Guinness’ butt but they did seem to want to stick pressed against each other while in the box and outside. 

Our main concern atm is Bleu seemingly not reciprocating Guinness’ attentions as much. We tried the banana trick but Bleu didn’t seem to find Guinness’ bit. Does anyone have any tips for how to give a little push?

For now, we intend to keep them separated by the gate for their ‘out’ time (and switch sides they use each day) and then take them to the box+porch at the end for face time. Hopefully, if they get along in the box, we can let them expand onto the porch for face time.

[Sleepy]

Day 4 – Second Meet

No photos since my phone died before starting, alas.

Definitely some steps forward and back. On the plus side, the two appear to be more okay lying near each other through the gate and are okay eating their veggies beside each other.

However, during their face time, my sis insisted they spend part of it in a small x-pen (about twice the size of box) on grass since she wanted them to enjoy the grass and a change in scenery before bad weather hits. Some circling happened more than once and was stopped with spray bottle so we moved them back to their box and porch for the last bit of their face time. Once they seemed to calm down (we placed them beside each other and gave them pats for a few minutes), Guinness wanted to groom Bleu again and Bleu wasn’t trying to chase Guinness anymore. However, I had few questions.

1 ) We’re for sure keeping them in the box for next few days at least, save for potential stress bonding. Should we be concerned about impact circling might’ve had or is the fact they ‘reset’ once they were in the box and patted a bit a good thing?

2 ) Guinness really likes grooming Bleu, to the point she’ll spend minutes doing it. Is there a thing as too much grooming, especially while bonding?

3 ) Also in relation to grooming. I think part of when Guinness tends to get nippy is because she’s annoyed Bleu asks for grooming but won’t groom her back. We haven’t been able to get banana trick working with them. Is there anything else that might encourage Bleu to return the favor? I heard someone suggest peanut butter but I’m unsure if that’s safe for buns.

[Mikey]

1) It seems fine. You stopped it and they calmed down and were ok being near eachother without starting again. Its normal for them to circle, nip, mount, ect more often in new areas as they still want to establish who is the boss of the other. Theyll seem like theyre restarting, but its more of a “im just letting you know, im still the boss” kind of thing

2) There is but there isnt. My Blue loves to groom everyone and everything. He is OCD with grooming. He will even groom my slippers. But he stopped after a few minutes. Now for Bombur, he grooms too much. He starts to doze off when hes grooming, so he has actually groomed holes into things and groomed a small chunk of Blue’s facial fur off before. He doesnt mean to, and Blue doesnt seem to mind when this does happen. So i think its something to watch to avoid raw skin, but over all, if both bunnies are happy, i wouldnt worry too much about it

3) I have tried drops of apple juice and bits of banana. Both worked for my buns, but didnt really encourage grooming. They simply ate/licked the other bunnys’ heads clean then went back to asking for grooms themselves. Its a sort of power struggle in the calmest way. The one who grooms is usually but not always the bottom bun and usually but not always the top bun will refuse to groom the bottom bun

[Sleepy]

Posted By Mikey on 5/25/2016 1:04 AM

1) It seems fine. You stopped it and they calmed down and were ok being near eachother without starting again. Its normal for them to circle, nip, mount, ect more often in new areas as they still want to establish who is the boss of the other. Theyll seem like theyre restarting, but its more of a “im just letting you know, im still the boss” kind of thing

2) There is but there isnt. My Blue loves to groom everyone and everything. He is OCD with grooming. He will even groom my slippers. But he stopped after a few minutes. Now for Bombur, he grooms too much. He starts to doze off when hes grooming, so he has actually groomed holes into things and groomed a small chunk of Blue’s facial fur off before. He doesnt mean to, and Blue doesnt seem to mind when this does happen. So i think its something to watch to avoid raw skin, but over all, if both bunnies are happy, i wouldnt worry too much about it

3) I have tried drops of apple juice and bits of banana. Both worked for my buns, but didnt really encourage grooming. They simply ate/licked the other bunnys’ heads clean then went back to asking for grooms themselves. Its a sort of power struggle in the calmest way. The one who grooms is usually but not always the bottom bun and usually but not always the top bun will refuse to groom the bottom bun

Thanks for the reply!

1 ) That’s good to know. They weren’t treating each other negatively today (a bit less direct interaction through gate but I think it was tiredness from being out earlier+time of day) so I’m assuming nothing’s happened to break things yet.

3 ) Will try to keep that in mind. We tried the nana trick again today but Bleu either doesn’t seem interested or Guinness is too much of a groom hog to let him do anything. We might try apple juice but if it doesn’t work, might just have to hope Bleu/Guinness are okay with her being the groom hog. He doesn’t seem to dislike it, since he’ll push into it, we’re just worried of Guinness feeling gyped and taking it out on him.

Day 5 – Third Meet

Buns got lots of time out today. Weather isn’t bad yet so we let them out onto the grass BUT in separate small x-pens this time. They didn’t interact much with each other through bars but I think they were more interested in new surroundings.

We let them out at their usual time but they seemed tired and less up for interacting through gate. We decided to try stress bonding them for their face time via running the dryer while leaving them in a box but interactions afterwards appear to be about the same as before (Guinness with lots of grooming, Bleu bending head for more kisses, both buns trying to get out of box). 

Though we’re more comfortable with buns being together – to point we can close most flaps on box or leave them alone their split play area for a very short time – we feel like we’re hitting a bit of a wall in terms of their interactions. Their box interactions are consistent and even with the split play area it’s easy for them to avoid interacting with each other in a more direct way. We might try stressing them with the vacuum+carrier if things don’t progress but we’re also debating doing a marathon bond session in their box (or a laundry basket) with a neutral litterbox and hay during the weekend.

[Sleepy]

Day 5 – Fourth Meet

Good progress today! While Guinness and Bleu have been flopping while the other is around, they haven’t done it so close together for so long. They spent long periods flopping near each other by the gate and both did a full flop at least once. They were doing so well we extended their planned face time in the box from half an hour to almost an hour. They still tried poking out of the box once and a while but we started getting different interactions between the two in the box compared to other dates (Guinness started grooming herself, Bleu started curling into her more, and they both decided to team up and nom on cardboard). 

Tentative plan is to let them try a short date (10-15min) in the bathroom in a day or two. If it goes well, we’ll shift there for their face time and go from there. If not, we can trust them in the box at least.

One quick question, though: I know buns can chase each other through the gate, which isn’t a good thing. However, we’ve been finding that if Bleu zooms around Guinness will follow and zoom from other side of the gate. Is this okay or something to watch for?

[Mikey]

Theyre both so cute! Does it look like aggression when they zoom like that, or does it look more like they are playing? Some rabbits get random energy surges and will zoom around, maybe Guinness is feeding off of Bleu’s energy in that moment. She could also think something is wrong when he zooms, so she zooms too because shes confused/stressed. I think it would be something to watch, but not something to stop just yet

[Sleepy]

It’s one of my fav pics of them, just for sheer cuteness factor ^^. I’ve been keeping an eye on them and it seems like it’s part of Guinness mimicking Bleu. She’ll usually follow his lead in things like nomming veggies or lying by the gate so zipping around seems like part of that. Will continue keeping eye, though, mainly for when they’re together than gated.

Day 6-7 – Fifth/sixth meet

We took the buns out for a little out time but rain started before they were out for long :c. They seemed to enjoy binking around and exploring with what little time they had though. 

Yesterday we introduced them to the washroom for a bigger neutral space and let them have face time for 20 min. There was a little chasing/circling and an attempted mount from Bleu but no where near the chasing from the first time we took them outside in the same pen. We intended to let them in the washroom for 30-40min today to help them build up to long term there but Guinness kept jumping the gate today to go hang with Bleu. After dumping her back on her side several times, we let them stay together for a short while. Guinness promptly went to grooming Bleu and they got along enough that Bleu let Guinness eat some of his veggies off his plate when he was nomming.

However, some circling was still occurring so we put Guinness back on her side with her veggies. When we were going to put them in the washroom again, she decided to go back to Bleu’s side a while longer instead. Bleu doesn’t seem like he dislikes her there but he still tries to assert his dominence.

We’re currently debating: should we take them back to the washroom and build them up there, since it’s neutral? Or should we just start building up their face time within the common play area but in a small space (so we’d just rearrange the gate to ‘box’ them in rather than separate them) since they seem to be relatively okay with the other in their play space?

[Sleepy]

Day 8 – Seventh Meet

Couldn’t get any interesting pics today, alas.

We’re not completely sure about today’s meet. Since Guinness and Bleu were behaving through gate today and they’d managed okay in relatively same area yesterday, we decided to use the play area for their face time. We made a small enclosure with the gate and allowed it to overlap across both ‘sides’ of the play area and took out their boxes and toys. Guinness still wanted to groom Bleu a lot and Bleu still curled into Guinness but we got more attempts of dominance today than so far. A few attempts at circling (we sprayed both buns and then gave them pats) and Bleu managed to hump Guinness for a few seconds before we pushed him off her.

Since the buns still seemed amiable towards each other (and nommed cilantro together before we put them back), we’re thinking we might try this set up again for the same short time, but use the vacuum to break up circling instead of the sprayer. If scuffles appear the same or (hopefully not) worse, we’ll step back to the washroom.

[Sleepy]

Day 9 – Eighth Meet 

Decided to go back to the bathroom for neutral territory after all and it was worth it! 

Their play time with the gate was a bit surprising today since we’re used to Guinness jumping the gate to go be with Bleu. However, today Bleu jumped the gate twice to go hang with her. We put them both back but it was sorta nice in some ways, since Bleu isn’t as affectionate with Guinness as she is him.

Likewise, in the bathroom, we managed to get some nice reactions from the two. I noticed the two were freaked out at the sound of the upstairs bathroom running so turned on the shower for a few minutes to stress them. The sound made Bleu promptly hop into the shelf and Guinness was huddled nearby for a while before hopping in too for a while. She adapted to the shower going a lot quicker so I turned it off but it seemed to work well for them. Bleu actually groomed Guinness for a while after – the first time since their first meet through the gate – and there wasn’t many scuffles compared to yesterday. Bleu tried mounting Guinness again (she hopped away) and there was the start of a circling but didn’t have to spray them to cut it out. 

Cutest thing I wish I got a video of was at the end of their face time. I put them against each other and gave them a massage and I started hearing Guinness chittering happily. I kept doing it a while longer and Bleu started chittering too. Soon I had them going in stereo.

Will probably take them to the bathroom again for their face time, since today worked well. Today was 30min together so tomorrow might try for 45-50 and, if it works out, might consider trying to introduce a neutral box and let them spend a session of play time in there. 

[Sleepy]

Day 10 – Ninth Meet

Both positive and negatives, but I’m not sure the negatives are wholly bad.

We took Guinness and Bleu outside in separate pens today before moving them back inside to the bathroom for their face time. Mostly, it felt like today the buns were trying to negotiate their relationship. Guinness still spent long periods grooming Bleu with Bleu curling into her and they even tried binking on the ceramic floor. At some points, it looked like they were trying to invite the other to play by jumping up a little and then doing a small run. However, both were definitely asking for attention from the other. So Bleu would hop up to Guinness and ask for grooming and then when Guinness stopped, he’d push into her or occasionally thumped. I’m not sure if Guinness asked for attention during this one instance or if Bleu instigated it but he started grooming her, thumped, and then kept grooming her. Later, they both put down their heads asking for attention but neither gave in at that point.

There was one circling I sprayed them for, though. Session also ended with another bun massage with them against each other.

The tentative plan is to aim for 45-50 again, since they don’t feel like they’ve progressed enough to go further yet. Do these seem like signs of just negotiating things or am I misreading and these are red flags?

[Sleepy]

Day 11/12 – 10th and 11th

Blurry pic but I liked this one the most

We did 50 minutes in the washroom yesterday and over an hour and a half today. Yesterday, they were still working things out. Some mutual grooming and a thump but they seemed to be settling in. They spent more time apart exploring the bathroom and relaxing more. However, Bleu tried humping Guinness from the front twice after grooming her before I pushed him off to preserve his bits (fortunately Guinness was chill enough to let it happen for a bit). Guinness also amusingly wagged her tail at him before hopping off when he kept demanding for grooming when she was busy with her own grooming. 

Today, we decided to try their out time in the bathroom since things are being more around in their usual play area. We put a few more towels down so they could hop without slipping all the time and gave them a litterbox to share. It went very well~ They were following each other around but no chasing or worry about circling and were even binking around close to each other. 

They also seem to be coming to a relative understanding about grooming. Guinness still does most of it but when they both lower their heads for grooming, Bleu will occasionally groom her instead when she asks or will give her a few licks before doing his own thing. Amusingly, Guinness really wanted to be groomed in pic but Bleu was busy cleaning himself so she just tofu bunned until he gave her an opening and promptly got up and shoved her head at him until he gave in.

Tomorrow we should hopefully have their usual play area free so we can try letting them have their face time there. Hopefully they’ll carry over some of this good will there~

[Sleepy]

Day 13-17 – 12th to 16th meets

https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B6lHVNSPci7wZFpFYzctVFBsY28/view?usp=sharing

A vid of today’s meet! Mostly because I was trying to get a video of them zooming around-potentially play chasing (I’m honestly not sure – it doesn’t feel aggressive since buns are binking around and then zooming or trying to get the other one to chase. However, I’m worried of misreading it)

We ended up taking them back to the shared play area with some time outdoors in separate pens. The first day back seemed to go well with a half-hour date so we extended it to hour and a half the next date. However, we started seeing some scuffling and had to get the sprayer out. Third day we took them for a car ride but we’re unsure if it helped much, as they were largely the same after they calmed down. However, less sprayer use has been needed.

Tonight, we got some interesting behavior but we’re not entirely sure if it’s good or bad. As mentioned above, I’m not fully sure if it’s full on chasing or “playful” chasing but they were doing a lot of bouncing and zooming around, both apart and together. Sometimes they’d run at the other and then zip away or promptly shove head for grooming. There was at least one incident that was a clear lunge and that got sprayed. 

One nice thing is the buns have no problem sharing a litterbox and will eat from the same plate (Bleu even stole some from Guinness’ mouth). However, they’re not quite fully relaxed with each other and are still working out dominant behaviors. Both will occasionally have stare offs of demanding grooming and while there’s a bit more reciprocity, it also leads to one hopping up to the other when they’re doing something and repeatedly shoving their heads at the other or nipping the other. Also, though they behave enough we can briefly leave them alone together, they’re not quite at the point of relaxing with each other. Guinness will occasionally flop down but even if he grooms her, Bleu will take the chance to try and mount her or nip her to move/for attention.

Is there a way to encourage them to be a bit more cozy with each other? I tend to give them bun massages at least once or twice a session with them against each other but they usually don’t themselves, save for grooming or if they both was access to the hay in the litterbox. 

[Sleepy]

Day 18 – 17th Meet

Buns sharing their hay tunnel~

Today was pretty good. Still no flopping beside each other but there was only one time I needed the sprayer and they spent a lot of time curling into each other for grooming. While there was still some dominance behaviors (both wanting grooming, Bleu still trying to mount Guinness), the bunnies mostly worked it out by hopping onto the couch to get away from the other if there was something going on they didn’t want. 

We’re starting to get idea buns usually are more likely to be more nippy or aggressive early in session and then calm down towards the end. Part of the reason could be because their ‘calm down’ period is nearer to their sleepy time or because they’re not housed beside each other (due to spacing reasons) so are separated for a long period before seeing each other again, thus requiring them to readjust again. 

We’re thinking of trying some marathon bonding soon to see if we can get buns a bit more cemented. Hopefully this’ll help with some breakthroughs and get them ready to try and move into the next stage of potentially moving in together.

[Sleepy]

Day 19 – 18th Meet

 

 

Good progress today! Bunnies snuggled on their own for first time, today. This is also the first time they’ve both flopped beside each other without a gate seperating them. They spent a long time flopped over and grooming each other, though Bleu still nudged Guinness up when she was flopped over on her own before. He’s still trying to mount her but we’re not sure if this will fade once they’re settled or he’s going to be the type to always want to do it (in which case, our concern will be ability for buns to hop away from each other when they want in their main enclosure).

We decided to let them interact for almost three hours today. There was one almost chase but it ended without interference. We’ll probably do another long session to help build them up for next step.

[Sleepy]

Day 20 – 19th Meet

No pics but unexpected thing happened today. We let the buns be out for about three hours again today and they were getting along. They relaxed a little and groomed each other and spent a lot of time bouncing around or tearing away at their box. We weren’t watching them as much (though still in area) since we wanted to give them time to interact and they’ve been behaving at a level we feel we don’t need our eye on them all the time.

However, towards the end, Guinness mounted Bleu for the first time. It caught us off-guard since she’s never done that before and it’s usually Bleu who tries mounting her. Bleu squirmed out from under her after a few humps and we were worried at first since they were still scuffling around the box but afterwards they seemed okay. Bleu and Guinness were still grooming each other and seemed okay when we put them away.

We’re unsure if this means we’re going to be looking forward to a dominance scuffle tomorrow or if this will be more of a one off thing. We’re hoping that this will be a “positive” mounting rather than one that ends with a lot of discomfort or a fight, based on the buns reactions after.

The tentative plan is to do a long marathon session tomorrow around the 4+ hour range and see how things go. If they seem ready for it, we’ll try moving them into Guinness’ pen on sat so we have the day to spray things down and set things up, as well as just having a night we can sleep by them to be sure they’re ready/are bonded.

[Sleepy]

Day 21 – 20th Meet

 

A really good session today! Buns snuggled side by side on their own for the first time today. It came thanks to a bit of a scare and an unintended stress session.

Guinness managed to crack one of her nails and was leaving blood wherever she hopped. We tried staunching it but she wouldn’t stay still so we rushed her and Bleu to the vet. Fortunately, she’d stopped bleeding mostly by the time we got there and the vet only charged us for clipping her nails and buns got a nice long car ride out of it to help stress bond them.

Though Bleu decided to hump her when they got back, they managed to stay together for four hours today without an issue. We would’ve been tempted to let them stick together for the night but we wanted to make sure Guinness recovered.

Tomorrow will probably be the day we clean out Guinness pen and scrub it so the two can try moving in together. Really hoping it works out~

[Sleepy]

Day 22-23 – 21-22nd Meet

  

 

 The buns are now bonded~ 

They were getting along two nights back for 3-4 hours so we cleaned out Guinness pen, vinegar-watered everything down, and tried combining things from both Guinness and Bleu’s pens they were familiar with or shared. No full blown fights but there was a few scuffles here or there in early in the night that were broken up with the sprayer.

Guinness seemed mostly okay with Bleu being there, once she calmed down about the changes we’d made to ‘her’ pen since she was okay flopping near him and giving him kisses within fifteen minutes. However, she also humped him more than she has the entire bonding process – which we largely allowed, since she was humping him from the back anyway, Bleu didn’t seem affected too negatively by it, and she’d usually hop off on her own and give him a few licks after. Bleu, meanwhile, it was an adjustment period since Guinness’ pen is smaller than his and he was staying downstairs before. After the first hour or so, though, they settled in for the night until another brief scuffle in the morning when they were becoming active again and Bleu tried humping Guinness. However, they quickly calmed down and behaved for their sleepy period long enough for me to actually sleep.

They spent the next day dozing near each other and behaved fine when we took them out for their play time but we spent the next night beside the pen anyway to be sure. The night passed without incident and with snuggling, though they got restless in the morning and started banging on the bars because they wanted attention from me. Once I gave them their veggies and refilled their pellets/water, they were happily sharing both the veggie plate and one of the bowls of pellets, despite another pellet bowl being right beside them.

We’ll be keeping an eye on them for the next few days but they’re at a point we don’t feel like we need to directly supervise them/consider them bonded. We still plan on upgrading them to free range buns in the kitchen but we’ll wait a month, most likely, to allow the bond to cement and give them time to adjust the changes. We’re happy, though, that after months of waiting and three weeks of bonding Guinness and Bleu are finally together~

[Author]

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