Sorry this is going to be a long post, but there’s a lot about my buns that may help describe my situation…

First let me introduce you to my 3 buns…

Mr. Peepers – 2 year old neutered male Holland Lop.  Our first, and he admittedly holds a special place in our hearts.  He’s an extremely sweet bun who seems to love everyone.  He hates being held, but will sit for hours at your feet for pets and will groom us back while we pet him.  He seems so fragile in comparison to other buns and we tend to get a little overprotective of him.

Tronic – 2 year old spayed female Dutch “diva”.  We adopted Tronic at 10 months old after a breeder decided her litters weren’t show quality.  She had at least one, maybe two litters before we got her.  We spayed her immediately.  We attempted bonding Tronic and Mr. Peepers for quite some time.  She doesn’t seem interested, and after a few nasty fights, I have trouble trusting her alone with him.  Mr. Peepers took to her almost immediately and grooms her right away.  Tronic will go over to him and put her head down asking for grooming.  If Mr. Peepers doesn’t groom her, she boxes him.  She also sometimes does it after she gets tired of him grooming her.  She has never groomed back or showed any affection toward him.  She is extremely territorial, and still after all this time, marks right next to his cage as soon as she gets out for playtime.  We recently adopted a third bun, Annie when we decided Tronic is much happier alone and we’re ok with that.  We moved her to her own room and she is a completely different bunny – happy and playful, and she runs up to us as soon as we enter the room.  When she lived in the same room as Mr. Peepers, it was difficult to even get her to come out for playtime.

Annie – Our newest.  She’s a shelter bun and believed to be about 4 months old.  She was spayed last month, and we think she’s either an English Lop with shortish ears for the breed or a Velveteen Lop.  The shelter said she was Holland, but I’m confident there isn’t  a drop of holland in this bun!  She’s about 5 pounds right now, and we have no idea how big she’ll get.  (Anyone who knows English / Velveteen, we could use some help identifying her!).  We’ve decided to call her a LabraLop because she is so puppy-like.  She’s very outgoing and has already taken quite a liking to us.  She’s teaching us new meanings of bunny-proofing because she can get into things the other two would never be able to!  We really hope to bond her with Mr. Peepers as he seems to desperately want bunny companionship.  She showed interest in Tronic too when their cages were all in the same room, but Tronic just freaked every time she walked near her cage – which is why we moved her out.  Annie came into the shelter with a brother who she got along with before her surgery.  Her brother was adopted seperately so they weren’t bonded after.  She has been introduced to other males in the shelter and we were told she did well.  We did not take Mr. Peepers to meet her at the shelter because it is an hour drive and he becomes extremely nervous and not himself in new situations – at the vet he just climbs right up me for protection, and he is not a bun who likes to be held!   With how his personality changes in new places, we didn’t think we’d get a good idea of who he’d like anyway, but he seems to like everyone so we figured we’d be ok. 

As we have failed a bond before, we really want to get this right.  We also hope to eventually be able to at least have Tronic live peaceably in the same room, as we’re running out of space!

So far, we have let both Annie and Mr. Peepers out individually in their shared room while the other was in their cage so they could sniff each other out with the protection of bars between them.  They both are very curious about each other.  Annie sometimes shows slight agression when Mr. Peepers approaches her cage (nipping at the bars, she boxed once but stopped as soon as I said her name).

They had their first date last night in a neutral corner of our hallway.  They were indifferent mostly, but then Annie started nipping at Mr. Peepers.  We stopped her 3 times, they’d be ok for a minute, then she’d nip again, then he nipped at her (first time we’ve ever seen him show aggression that wasn’t in self defense), so we called it  a night.  I hope he nipped just because he was tired of her doing it to him, otherwise he does act like he likes her.  They spent last night in each other’s cages to try to get them used to each other’s scent.  

What should we do next??  Is it possible for Tronic to get at least semi-comfortable with the others?  Should we focus on their bond, then try to add Tronic, or periodically bring her around too?

I will post updates as we go… We hope to try another date tonight.

Thanks for any help!