Fight and broken skin

[Rabbittherabbit101]

We adopted a 6-8 month old rabbit and tried to introduce her to our 2 year old rabbit. Our 2 year old rabbit attacked her and drew some blood.

It’s a long weekend here in Ireland and our vet isn’t open until Tuesday. The cut seems superficial. Just a small bit of blood and some missing fur but she’s eating fine and still drinking water. I cleaned it with a bit of saline on a cotton pad and the bleeding has stopped. I will make a check up appointment on Tuesday to bring her in.

I feel incredibly guilty. The bun comes from a home where she was abused by another rabbit and was eventually surrendered. Does anyone have any tips or tricks I can do to make her more comfortable in our house and eventually how to introduce them again?

[Bam]

Keeping the bite wound clean will probably be enough. Have a look every day so you see that its healing up nicely. No other intervention is required unless you see signs of infection (marked swelling, seepage etc).

In order to bond two buns they should both be castrated and have healed at least 2 weeks from their procedures. Intact rabbits will not bond properly.

Do not feel guilty! Rabbits are peculiar in that they really like living together with other rabbits, but at the same time, they are by nature highly suspicious of invaders of their territory. Wild rabbits spend lots of time and energy constructing their intricate underground warrens, so they’re not really keen on letting just anybunny move in. Even if our buns don’t build warrens, they still have a lot of the same genes as their wild relatives.

I know our bonding expert Dana will see this and provide you with lots of tips and great advice.

 

 

[Rabbittherabbit101]

Thankfully it’s not a large cut. She has had some traumatic few weeks so I just want to give her the best life she can have and this just makes my heart hurt.

She has actually started rubbing her chin on me which is really sweet considering I am the one who has to clean her wound and I thought she likely would not like me for that.

She is such a sweet little rabbit and I just want to make sure she’s taken care of. I am going to get her spayed in the next couple weeks and then possibly try bonding them again really really slowly. Introductions are hard and our rabbit has been alone for a long time. She was even the last of her litter to be adopted and it was weeks in between. So I think it’ll take some getting used to.

[Bam]

Sometimes bonding takes a long time, but that is still considered normal.

I have found with all my buns that they somehow understand that you are helping them when you do wound care or syringe feeding etc. They may hate it while it’s going on, they might fight you and even bite, but afterwards they acknowledge you as their their friend. If she chins you, she is claiming you as hers ☺

[Rabbittherabbit101]

She actually isn’t fighting me when I clean her cut so she’s pretty docile. She’ll be okay. We just need to get through the next couple months and it will slowly get there. A woman who bonds rabbits in my area told me to put their cages close to each other and then do cage swapping. I’ll likely wait until after she’s spayed to do that. I know it’ll get there. It may be hard but I’m willing to do it.

[DanaNM]

It sounds like you have mostly sorted things out! Sorry just seeing this now.

Spaying/ neutering (for both buns) is very important for successful bonding, so the plan to get her spayed is a good one. Then you should wait at least 3-4 weeks for her hormones to settle. I agree that cage swapping is great, but I think waiting till after she’s healed from her spay is a good move. While they are hormonal they smell different, so all the swapping will probably just mean you clean up a lot of pee and poop because they will be marking all over the place.

Letting the new bun settle in to her new home is also usually really helpful to a strong bond forming.

I would read through this info since you are new to bonding: https://binkybunny.com/infocategory/bonding/

There are many ways to bond rabbits, but some can be quite stressful for the rabbits and a bit dangerous if you are inexperienced with rabbit behavior. The info summarized in that link should give you a good starting point, and you can post again once you start pre-bonding to update us on how the buns are doing. 🙂

. . . The answers provided in this discussion are for general guideline purposes only. The information is not intended to diagnose or treat your pet. Seek the advice of your veterinarian or a qualified behaviorist.  

[Rabbittherabbit101]

Thanks so much. We have currently set up the cages about 2 feet from each other just so they can get used to each other being in the same place. Rabbit (that’s the name of our older rabbit) won’t stop staring at Blueberry (that’s the name of our new rabbit) but I think they will learn to live with each other. Rabbit has started biting her cage quite substantially. Which she used to do and stopped once she was spayed. So I am not sure why she’s started again but it is likely a territorial thing.

[DanaNM]

That sounds like a good plan. 🙂 That all sounds like normal behavior that should calm down with time.

. . . The answers provided in this discussion are for general guideline purposes only. The information is not intended to diagnose or treat your pet. Seek the advice of your veterinarian or a qualified behaviorist.  

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