Just to clarify, is your male bonded and living with one of the females 24/7? If so, then you should not separate him from the bunny he’s bonded with. That would make both bunnies very depressed, especially if one would be going to live alone outdoors.

Or are you mostly concerned with the solo bunny who is not bonded? Sorry if I’m misunderstanding things!

Why is he being moved outside? There is really no such thing as an “indoor” and “outdoor” rabbit, although some bunnies do enjoy time outside more than others.

In an ideal world, you could have a set-up where your pair lives as a neighbor to the solo bun, so the solo bun would benefit from having them as a companion. Or alternately, find a match for your solo bun and have two pairs.

In any case, if your male is fully bonded with one of the females, they should stay together, regardless of where they end up housed.

Separating a bonded pair of rabbits is not the same as when one rabbit passes away. When one rabbit dies in a pair, the other understands what has happened as they usually spend time with the body and know the other rabbit was sick. And even this can cause depression in the widowed rabbit. But when they are separated for other reasons, they will look for each other and become very stressed, often sinking into deep depression and even stasis. I would be especially worried about the female bunny left single in that situation.

So, I have to urge you not to separate the currently bonded pair, even if the male gets along with both females. It would be better to keep the female in a smaller, well-bunny proofed area with him, than to separate them. Many bunnies live in a “bunny room”, or people with apartments have basically one room’s worth of space for their bunnies, and they are very happy.

Since this is really an issue with bunny proofing, I think a better solution is to improve your bunny proofing. Have you checked out these tips? https://binkybunny.com/infocategory/bunny-proofing/

If you search the forum for bunny proofing and other specific terms (such as “bunny tearing carpet”) you will get lots of other suggestions.

There are lots of suggestions for protecting baseboards and carpeting, and it is important to provide alternative things to chew. My young bunny Cooper is very destructive but we keep him occupied with palm plates and snak shacks (a chew toy), and it keeps him away from the baseboards. I use heavy ceramic tiles to protect the carpet in “hot spots”. Cardboard cat scratchers are also great for carpet digging buns.

I think bunnies do better with more interaction, even if it means less space indoors. Outdoor bunnies tend to be somewhat forgotten about, and often medical issues aren’t noticed until it is too late.

You’re welcome! I’m glad to hear you will try to make it work inside. I think you will find bunnies are very adaptable to changes in their housing arrangements. In the process of moving cross country with our 4 bunnies we ended up staying with my in-laws for a bit, and had to have the bunnies confined to a room, split down the middle so one pair got each half. I was worried they would be unhappy, but honestly they all seemed fine with it! Cooper tried to hop the fence a few times, but it was more to get to the other bunnies, and less about space (we’re currently in a much larger home, and he still obsesses over the barrier). As long as they have enough space to do their zoomies and binkies, anything extra is a bonus. 🙂

It can be tough when a new bun throws a wrench in the works! My first house bun (Bunston) was super destructive and I had no idea what I was doing with bunny proofing. He even taught our other bunny that chewing the carpet was the best thing ever. Many holes in the carpet later we sort of got a system down (heavy tiles + cat scratchers).

Then our more recent buns were all little angels who didn’t chew anything! Then Cooper came a long.. and reminded me what it was like to have a young bunny around with a LOT of energy to get into trouble!  He has more obsessive energy, so once I get him going on a project he’s fine, but when he’s done with that I have to keep a close eye on him so he doesn’t get invested in eating the baseboards!  I definitely agree that it may take some experimenting with dif chew toys to find one he loves more than he loves your baseboards.

They aren’t the most “natural” of toy, but those “snak shak” logs have really saved my furniture (they are kind of like edible particle board for bunnies), he tends to go through about 1 every 2 months.  Compressed hay cubes are also a big hit.

With Bunston his urge to dig carpet was linked to an urge to tunnel, so I also would get those cardboard concrete building forms from the hardware store, then stuff them with paper for him to tunnel through.

That’s tough. I do wonder if perhaps they could just be restricted while unsupervised, then while supervised they could free-roam a larger area and you could still spend time with them on the sofa? My Cooper (and my bridge bunnies Bunston and Bertha) could not have unsupervised free-roam because they were just too destructive. So they live in a large cube condo when unsupervised, and get supervised free-roam time (ends up being 6-8 hrs a day on avg). You might even build them a cube condo in the main room, so they would have more interaction that way. Many bunnies are just not good candidates for free-roaming, but can be very happy with good set-ups and appropriate exercise time.

I think sometimes it’s also important to break the cycle of a bun obsessing over something, because they get involved with their “projects”. Sometimes some time away from an area will help them forget about it.