Bonding 2 males – Plz help :)

[claor]

Hey guys, Long time reader, first time poster.

I have two boys (both neutered).

Franklin ( 1 year and 5 months old)

Murphy (7 months old)

I got murphy so franklin would have a friend, But it seems they are not getting along.
I started by putting droppings in the others litter, swapping cages, houses, food bowls etc. both showed aggression through the bars of the cages.
They were then separated (kept at different houses whilst Murphy was neutured).
When they were separate i got look-alike teddies and stuffed them with their fur etc. both murphy and franklin liked the surrogate teddies and would groom them, this seemed to be a good sign.
I brought them back together just recently and tried to stress bond them on a short 10 minute car trip, they snuggled up to each other during. I then immediately put them in a neutral  pen, but they  were showing aggresion to each other almost right away.

They had a couple of  fights, (growling/nipping/hitting) which I broke up almost immediately.
Murphy originally fought back but seems very scared of franklin now and likes to hide but does not seem to know how to be submissive to franklin. Most of the time they sat on other ends of the pen.

I feel i might have to just let them fight it out a bit more? I am just scared they will hurt each other and don’t know how sooon to jump in.

No fur was pulled and neither seemed injured at all.
Is anyone able to tell me how to tell when to step in ??

In hindsight i should have got a female to bond with franklin, but it is to late now.

Thanks in advance for any replies

Jason

[Sindri]

Hi I recently finally got my 2 bonded after about 8 months. I would suggest stress bonding in something like a box then move up to a bigger neutral space when things progress. It took me 8 months of off and off bonding to get my two to finally bond. I didn’t start off with a box and I wish I had. What I did was move the box around when fights began. You could put the box on top of a dryer that is on, walk them around or drag the box. I did lots of things like that being I couldn’t take mine for car rides most of the time. Btw I got a female to bond with my male and he hated her from the start.
Anyway just start out slow short visits in a small box where its hard to fight in and they can snuggle. Once they seem to be doing good in that box either make the box bigger and or extend the time together and go from there. Best of luck!

[claor]

Thank you for the reply!

That is a great idea!
I will certainly try this. How long did you make each bonding session? After your bonding session did you separate  your rabbits so they could not see each other ? or did you have both cages close?
thanks again Sindriona!
All other suggestions are welcome people

jason

[Sindri]

I would start out like you did maybe 10 to 15 minute sessions. My rabbits had their own bunny rooms so they were separated where they couldn’t see each other. I remember starting out doing visits with their cages side by side and they seemed to get pretty spun up. I found out they were probably territorial of their cages so I quit doing that. I would if you could keep them totally separated but I don’t know how you have them set up or that is even an option for you.
If you like check out my bonding thread its Back to bonding Usagi and Kilala that might help as well. Let me know how things go. I know I had a tough time but I got good advice and bonding ideas from this site.

[calipa_st]

How do they live? I had mine in an xpen separated with nic cubes. It took me a while (five months) to finally bond rodan and calvin… first tried luck and calvin, then rodan and calvin, then dozer and rodan, then back to calvin and rodan because they seemed to really gravitate towards each other. i had separated them for three months (different floors of the house) then when I noticed calvin always trying to lay near rodan’s pen I tried again.
I did bathtub sessions, I did kitchen sessions, and then one car ride in a box carrier… then I just went for it, and let them live together. there was some chasing in the pen the first two nights and then they just…became best buds.
How long has it been since the neuters?

[claor]

Posted By Sindriona on 9/07/2014 11:59 AM

I would start out like you did maybe 10 to 15 minute sessions. My rabbits had their own bunny rooms so they were separated where they couldn’t see each other. I remember starting out doing visits with their cages side by side and they seemed to get pretty spun up. I found out they were probably territorial of their cages so I quit doing that. I would if you could keep them totally separated but I don’t know how you have them set up or that is even an option for you.
If you like check out my bonding thread its Back to bonding Usagi and Kilala that might help as well. Let me know how things go. I know I had a tough time but I got good advice and bonding ideas from this site.

That sounds good, i will definitely give it a try. Keeping them totally separate apart from short bonding sessions is possible. I will read through your thread and hopefully learn a few things that i can apply to my rabbits .

thanks!
Jas

[claor]

Posted By calipa_st on 9/07/2014 12:57 PM

How do they live? I had mine in an xpen separated with nic cubes. It took me a while (five months) to finally bond rodan and calvin… first tried luck and calvin, then rodan and calvin, then dozer and rodan, then back to calvin and rodan because they seemed to really gravitate towards each other. i had separated them for three months (different floors of the house) then when I noticed calvin always trying to lay near rodan’s pen I tried again.
I did bathtub sessions, I did kitchen sessions, and then one car ride in a box carrier… then I just went for it, and let them live together. there was some chasing in the pen the first two nights and then they just…became best buds.
How long has it been since the neuters?

At the moment they are side by side in their cages, we let one out at a time with free range of most of the house (half a day each). they are only both in their cages overnight.
this was them after the fight in the pen.

They were laying down next to each other, but as soon as they realized i was there they started to swipe at each other through the bars again. could it possibly be a jealousy thing?? We dont really hear them fighting at the cages anymore from other rooms in the house, seems to only happen when we are there with them.

They were both neutered at around 5 months of age.

Also this video is roughly how franklin and murphy fought when put in the pen together on neutral territory.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X9HLjPUyBiU

Franklin being the black and white aggressor and murphy being  the brown one, however murphy fought back even less then the brown one. Is this kind of fighting to much? or should we not jump in as quick so they can sort out who is dominant ?

cheers for  the reply calipa.

Jas

[Sindri]

At first that wasn’t going so bad. Mine fought horribly from the start. I think around the 1:40 time frame of your video was how mine would start a visit. Fur would be flying like crazy. If I were you I would separate them when fighting like that breaks out and stress bond. Or perhaps stress them at the beginning of a session then put them in that area. If things get bad always pick them back up and stress them again. That ultimately was how I did things my last go around. My rabbits were terribly aggressive towards each other and like I said in my thread it took 8 months or so to finally get them bonded.

Oh and about the jealousy issue, I too noticed the same thing with my two when I had them in the expen and the aggressor of my 2 was the male; he would look at me and then do something naughty like nip the other one or run up on her in an aggressive manner and then look at me. I don’t know why they do that.

[claor]

Thanks again for the reply!
i will make a box and over the next few days try what you have suggested and what is in your thread
i will report back with updates
any other suggestions are always welcome

cheers

Jason

[claor]

Ok, so the box thing didnt work to well

Initially it worked great, but after about 10 minutes (right before we were going to end the session) murphy popped his head up to have a look around, franklin thought this movement was hostile and they begun fighting. Fur was going everywhere, they latched onto each other (all while we were trying to separate them). then finally murphy screamed .

It was very traumatic for everyone. We have not put them back together since, and a day after the fight we found a small scratch/gash on murphy. It is very clean looking and has healed up.

This is how they are currently set up

They show little to no aggression through the bars, the only time aggression is shown is when murphy binkies, franklin runs back and forth along the side of the fence to follow him, but it dosnt seem very aggressive?

They always put there heads down to each other and nudge each other requesting grooming, like this

No aggression is shown at all when they do this.
The problem is, Murphy does not groom anything and franklin will not usually groom first. we can pat murphy as much as we want, then put our hands out and he WILL NOT lick us in return. Franklin knows that if he licks us back we will groom him again. Franklin is clearly dominant when they are together. My theory is, if we can teach murphy to groom things, franklin will accept that murphy is being submissive.

So my question is: can you train a rabbit to lick you/another rabbit? If so how?

Cheers and thanks for all your help so far!

Jas

[LBJ10]

You can try smearing a little banana on his head. Hehe!

[JackRabbit]

Check out http://www.wheekwheekthump.com. Another BBer bonded 7 bunnies and this is her website, complete with diaries and tips

[Lea]

I’m new so I can’t be of much help, but oh my goodness is Murphy ever cute <3 <3 I love that colour

Good luck with the bonding!

[Author]

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