Hi everyone,

Okay, this is the dilemma:

A year ago, we had two bunnies: a 5 year old neutered male bunny (named Thumper) and a 5 year old non-sprayed female bunny (named Joy). Despite Joy not being sprayed, they got on very well together. She was slightly dominant to him, but never aggressive. 

A few months ago, Thumper passed away very suddenly. It was a great shock, since he was always very healthy. We miss him very much. Joy started to become very lonely in the the next two months, and would often seek comfort from everyone. We knew we had to find a new partner for her, so we started looking online at rabbits in animal rescue shelters (we had gotten Joy from an animal rescue shelter, too). 

We found a rabbit, who we call George, who was described as a friendly, calm, and well tempered, neutered Male. He is around three years old, although that isn’t certain. The reason why we chose him was because Thumper was also a very calm, friendly rabbit, who was below Joy in the pecking order. 

We went to visit him at the shelter, and the staff there put Joy and George together in the neutral area. Now, we haven’t had many experience in bonding before. When we were bonding Thumper and Joy, they got on almost instantly, and they never had any problems. So when Joy and George were put together we were a bit inexperienced in how it works when bonding two rabbits. The bonding area was quite large, and Joy and George barely went near each other. When Joy did get curious and went over to George, George would hop away. This already felt weird, since when Thumper and Joy were first introduced, they started jumping on each other (for dominance), but the person there said that this was a good sign, since at least they weren’t fighting. 

We though it was going well, so we decided to bring George home, with Joy and George hopefully bonding during the car ride, since the drive took two hours. When we got home we put them in a neutral area together, though it was a lot smaller than at the shelter. This is when it started going badly, Joy kept on chasing George, and George refused to go after Joy. Joy is also a lot slower than George, so she could never catch up to him. This would continue for a few minutes, until they both got tired and rested (far away from each other), with George completely wide-eyed.

We separated them at night, so we could get a bit of sleep and so they could have some time to cool-off. But immediately when we put them together again, they would be at it again. George would also start pooping a LOT when Joy got near him. This was all very frustrating, since bonding Thumper and Joy had been so easy. The only time when George would be happy, was when we let them run around the house (moving away all the cables and other dangerous things), he would start doing binkies (he would not be anywhere near Joy). 

George also has this thing where if you start acting threatening to him, or go in his way, he would start licking you. This is how we got them to groom sometimes, by pushing him towards Joy, even when he tried to hop away, and he would start licking her, almost like it is a form of bribery, like: ‘If I lick you, and be nice to you, you will be nice to me’.

After a few weeks they started doing quite well, they would lie next to each other often and groom each other. We though the bonding process was over, but then after a few days Joy’s hormones would kick in, and she would start chasing him. We refuse to have her sprayed, since she is quite old, and problems can arise if you spray a rabbit that is this age, and we don’t want to take that risk.

We have had George for about 4 months, and things aren’t looking so promising. If Joy goes anywhere near him, he would run to the other side of the cage. We know that Joy likes him, since she often goes to him with her head bowed (for grooming), but he is really scared of her. It is definitely the hormones of Joy that are causing the problems, but we can’t spray her anymore. 

So how can I help them bond better, without having to spray Joy? Or should we return George to the animal shelter, and look for a new partner for Joy? We really don’t want to do this since we have really come to love George. So, what are your suggestions? How can I help them get along better, and for Joy to stop being so wild, without spraying her? 

Thank you in advance, and thank you for reading this very very long forum question .