Exercise while bonding

[deadneonflies]

My bunny Zee has had run of the apartment since we brought her home 7 years ago.   Whenever me and my husband are home, she is allowed out of her cage for supervised play/exercise time until we go to bed at night.  This can be almost all day long.  She is quite used to this routine.  Well, we brought home Ripley on Sunday for the bonding process and I know if I let them out, they will fight and claim territories in the apartment, etc., so I have been leaving them in their seperated cages.  Ripley has not problem with this, for obvious reasons of a new place and being as shy bunny.  But Zee is not used to being cooped up like this.  She begs to be let out of her cage, but I am determined to get them to bond.  Can I still let Zee out for play time with Ripley locked safely in her cage?  If I did this, wouldn’t Zee start claiming territory now that there is a new bunny in the house?  Need advice on this topic please and thank you.

[vanessa]

I had a similar problem. My bunnies are on a bonding-break at the moment. Guin was fine in their bonding area. Happy actually. Lancelot was frustrated at the small space. I tried taking him out for exercise, but when I put him back in, it was a painful process of putting plum juice on her head for him to groom off, and an hour of stroking them to calm them down. I suppose if you had enough rooms/space, you could use separate exercise areas, or possibly the same exercise are but one bun at a time, and then put them back int he bonding area. I just had a really difficult time every time I put them back together. I would love to hear how your dilemma works out.

[deadneonflies]

I have not started even trying to exercise them, I’ve been super busy with work and stuff.  But I have thought a lot about this.  Zee’s favorite naughty place to go in the apartment was our bedroom.  It was off limits and we did shut the door whenever she had playtime, but sometimes she’d sneak in when we wern’t looking.  I’m thinking this might be the only place she has to get some exercise right now, which I am not too thrilled about.  With Ripley in the house, she could try to claim it has her domaine, which creates the same problem in the rest of the apartment.  SO…

I figured I would take this non exercise time to SUPER clean my apartment.  Without letting them out, there is not as much fur to clean up all the time.  So I’ve been super cleaning, vaccumming and dusting.  This way when it is time to start letting them both into the actual apartment, it doesn’t smell TOO much like Zee anymore.  I am hopeful of this method I guess.  It still doesn’t fix my initial problem, but they will just have to learn to get along and then they can play together.  It’s really up to them.

[vanessa]

I wish it were as easy as saying ” it’s all up to you bunnies!” My Lancelot LOVES to run around in my room. So around 8pm I put the dogs in their side of the house, block off the hallway, shut the doors in the hallway, and open the critter room. Then Lancelot can run around in the hallway, his room, and my room. I leave a litterbox in my room for him, but I leave his food and water in his room. I need to make another divider so I can let Guin out every second night. That way she can scoot past his half of the room, and get into the hallway and my room. He might not like that – but that’s the only way I can think of letting them both enjoy some exercise time.

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