So, sorry I’ve been AWOL! This first month or so of settling back in at home has been more hectic than I expected. I’ve also been trying to bond Humphrey and Perry, and seriously– there’s going to be bunny soup sometime in the near future if they don’t start showing some sort of consistent behavior.

When I brought them together for a first date, it was totally love at first sight– mutual grooming and flopping, food sharing, etc– and now that I’ve brought them home suddenly they’re acting completely different! And it’s not like it’s all fighting– the big issue is that they act totally inconsistently and give each other the wrong body language and REALLY mixed signals.

They’re okay in the bathtub, most of the time– Perry tries to bite Humphrey a little but for the most part there’s not a lot of actual fighting because Humphrey is too terrified of the tub to move. However, Perry will also lick Humphrey in the bathtub even though he’s definately the dominant bunny and very aggresive when it comes to attention (he bites anyone if they stop petting him, so it surprised me that he’s the licker– particularly since at their first meeting Humphrey was the more affectionate one.) It’s almost like he realizes Humphrey’s scared and is like… “There, there, big scardey rabbit.” When there is actual fighting, it’s usually because Humphrey does something like boxes Perry on the head, and then Perry will take a nice mouthful of his fur. But then Perry will just flop and watch Humphrey or something, and show no signs of agression, and then they’ll groom themselves at the same time or something.

On my mom’s bed (I.E., the family couch because we don’t understand furniture) they’re also more or less okay– they ignore each other as long as we keep petting them. They’re actually showing some progress there; the first few times we did it they fought, but last night we thought there was going to be an altercation, but then they just sort of walked away from each other. They also do a LOT of flopping at the same time and washing themselves at the same time here.

In an X-Pen in the kitchen, however, they fought a LOT– circling, fur in Perry’s mouth, Humphrey bopping Perry on the head, etc– so they haven’t ben back there in a long time.

In their cages, which are pressed together, they coexist very happily, and will often lay side by side through the bars, and do lots of activities (flopping, eating, cleaning, etc) at the same time. They also are in close enough proximity that they could easily chomp each other’s noses, but they don’t try at all. They show absolutely no aggression.

Unfortunately, I can’t try cage switching, because Perry is a dwarf rabbit and Humphrey is a 7+lbs, so Perry’s cage is too small for Humphrey. (They’ll eventually be living together in the X-Pen, so Perry’s cage is not a permanent solution for anyone)

I’m awfully confused with these two, because they’re not consistently fighting OR being nice to each other– they’re giving totally mixed signals and I don’t know what to do. o___O

Any suggestions?

(also, this is them in the tub–)

http://s101.photobucket.com/albums/m42/HJSoulma/?action=view&current=DSC00020.jpg

http://s101.photobucket.com/albums/m42/HJSoulma/?action=view&current=DSC00031.jpg

http://s101.photobucket.com/albums/m42/HJSoulma/?action=view&current=DSC00030.jpg

(yes, we do have a horrible mauve bathtub…)