Humping is a dominant behavior. This is extremely common and happens frequently with bonded rabbits or those bonding. Not unusual.

You are going to have to let them work this out on their own. If Stormy is upset you need to allow him to get away on his own. Obviously Bindi wants to be the top rabbit. If you continue to separate them for every little thing you may make very little progress.

Yes, it seems so ‘sexual’ but it really isn’t. My Deirdra does a scary thing to Lint from time to time: she will groom him and then hold him down between her front legs and back legs so that he is stuck under ther belly sideways. If he moves because he does get spooked, she squishes him down harder. It can last for 20 seconds. So, these things have a meaning in terms of denoting hierarchy or attempted dominance.

Like the others said, totally normal. Have you tried stressing them? If the humping goes on too much, it can cause Storm to react by fighting, so you might want to try some stressing right before putting them in the tub. I used a laundry basket and shook them around for 30 seconds to a few minutes, then dumped them in the tub. It definitely made for calmer sessions. Hannah still humped, and still does chase and nip sometimes, even though they’re bonded, but the stressing snapped her out of it when she was taking it too far.

Do you have a laundry basket you can put them in? I had a lot of success putting them in and shaking them around a bit. I did it right in the bathroom and I didn’t have to do it for long. I would definitely try this, then throw them in the bathtub together and see if you have a few moments of calm.

I would continue with it, but make sure you change things up. Do some stressing, change up the bathtub environment a bit if you can – just make it a slightly different situation so that they don’t go into it thinking it’s the same as the night before.

Why they make it so difficult… LPT, I have spent much time thinking about this, LOL, as I was stuck in bonding sessions. Of course, we know it isterritorialism but to really appreciate a rabbit’s bonding behavior think of yourself: Imagine you come home and there is a strange person in your kitchen, cooking dinner on your stove, using your stuff…. and now imagine, you can’t talk. Of course, this is a far fetch and we are not rabbits but you get the idea. ~

You know Petzy, I think my first instinct would be to hump that intruder cooking in my kitchen!

well, if you had no hands you might throw yourself on the stranger, which is basically humping.

Hahaha. That’s the funniest image.

LOL – that is funny! I don’t have a problem with a stranger cooking anything in my kitchen either as long as they feed me too :~)

The image is for LPT for her next session to cheer her up.

I could repost monkey’s video of her humping moosie with her back foot propped up on the baseboard if you like. hilarious, it was.

I havent posted much in my thread lately. Its been pretty much the same stuff, so there wasnt much of a point I’ll see if I can find that video