Most days, Pasternak stays in his large open crate type house, with his litter box and smaller house inside with plenty of hay and water (I give him greens in the evening – so far he loves romaine lettuce, carrots, cilantro, and he’s pretty happy about broccoli too.  Not so keen on bell peppers or celery).  In the evenings (and some times in the afternoon too if I’m home) I let him run around the living room/kitchen area where it’s safe for several hours (from around 4pm to ? – whenever I head to bed) and one of his favorite things is to run like a crazy rabbit at full speed toward me and then run in circles around me while I stand still.  He also makes a “humph” noise as he hops.  Is he purring?  It sounds more like a “heh heh heh” if you chuckled with your mouth closed.

Anyhow, does anyone know what this means?  He’ll run around me 3 or 4 times in one direction and then switch.  Then, he’ll run away from me a few feet and back to me.  Sometimes I run away from him and he chases me and then does some laps and then I “shuffle” towards him and then run away (I never RUN after him because I don’t want to terrify him).  Sometimes when I run away from him he stops, looks at me, and then comes running after me and runs around me in circles.  Is he just playing with me or is this some kind of bunny ritual/mating behavior/territorial gesture/bunny body language?

Usually after 5 − 10 minutes he will flop down and stretch out and I’ll pet him until he feels like bounding away again.  He’s very affectionate.  He does this with me and my boyfriend and when my boyfriend’s brother dropped by, he did it to him and was completely showing off “pop corning” around the room (we call it pop corn because he looks like a piece of popcorn exploding to the side, up, and every which way).