It’s been 8 weeks of trying… can I cry now?

[swedishbun]

Back in June, we adopted a lovely Jersey wool/angora bunny from HRS.  We took Bunny #1, Bubbles, on several dates, and eventually we settled with Lillemor.  She was spunky and bossy but excited to have a friend.  Bubbles was definitely humpy but was most at ease with her (after meeting more than 10 different bunnies on several occasions, she was really the right fit).

The background is that Bubbles (3 years old) has been a single bunny since 8 weeks old.  He’s obviously spoiled and has free range of the apartment.  He’s very loving (sleeps with us, grooms us) but also territorial and on rare occasion, aggressive.

Lillemor didn’t have such a loving upbringing.  She was abandoned at 5 months old with a group of 26 other siblings/cousins/mothers and was malnourished, matted, and underweight.  She spent three months with HRS where they gave her a lot of love, a whole ton of cleaning (she was a yellow bunny when she arrived, a white fuzzy bunny when we adopted her).  L can be defensive but also scared easily.

Our bonding ability is a bit limited in that we live in a small apartment (1.5 bedrooms).  We do have a car.  

I’ve set her up in an x-pen in the living room so that Bubbles can see her at all times.  They have dinner “together” (between the pen wire) since day 2.  In order to get her some exercise and playtime, I put up barriers in the living room to allow her roam around but access her litter box.

We’ve done bonding in the bathtub for a few days, then graduated to the bathroom floor for a few days.  Then we started bonding in the xpen. The first few weeks, I would sit in the pen with them for 3-5 hours a day.  After 4 weeks, we were mostly calm with some small bickering and cuts on everyone.  But no worse for the wear.

Then we went on vacation for three weeks and left them at the shelter. They stayed in separate pens but next to each other. When we got home, we were now in week 9 (6 weeks together at home, 3 weeks at the shelter).  Things haven’t been quite the same.

Bubbles gets incredibly angry and now has occasionally outbursts which are frankly, violent.  As of today, they will have to be separate for a few days because L got a bad cut (not bad enough to require stitches, but bad enough to be cleaned and checked). 

I’m doing bonding in a different location in the apartment (as if I have that much space!) with new mats (those lovely adult bed pee pads are amazing) and covering the x-pen ‘walls’ with towels.  I used a broom to separate the fights unless it becomes violent, at which I would jump in and separate the two.  Definitely not sitting in the pen with them (out of a 4 hour session, I sit in there 30 minutes total – 5 min here, 5 min there) has made Bubbles more aggressive towards L.

When they’re nice to each other, L will clean him (B does no such thing) and they will nap nose to nose.  They’re okay with using each other’s litterbox and totally fine to touch nose to nose when eating (provided the x-pen separates them).  But when they fight, oh goodness, it’s scary.

FYI, We are now in week 11 of bonding (including the 3 week separation).

After this cathartic diatribe, my questions are:

1.  Is there really hope? Will these two bond together one day?  When is that day?  Another month?  2? 

2. Is the broom idea good? 

3.  Are there other tricks to try? We’ve done car rides, bathtub, banana on the head, walk and go with a carrier.  Please be mindful that I have no neutral space in the apartment, so please don’t recommend me to go to a neutral space in there. We have space but it’s limited, a patio but no yard, and shared laundry facilities. 

4.  Any words of wisdom?

Thank you for reading.

[JackRabbit]

I’m probably not the one to give advice, but maybe separate them for a few days or little longer to give them a chance to “reset” and then start over with stress bonding and then very short face-to-face dates, then increase the amount of time together as you see positive results.

We have some very successful experienced bonders (I’m not one of them!) who can give you great advice.

[swedishbun]

Hi JackRabbit,

For the reset, do you advise they not see each other at all?  They love eating together and Bubbles loves sleeping/napping against her x-pen so I would hate to take it away.  But maybe I need to?

Also, to clarify, the fighting is the fur pulling kind and when I am not in the x-pen with them.  If I sit in the x-pen with them, it’s more lunging/nipping but nothing more.

[JackRabbit]

I had some of that, and then a full fight, when I tried bonding my pair with my single bun. I made alot of mistakes which is why I said I’m not probably not the one to give bonding advice!

My thought was completely apart for a few days, but I would really love to hear what the “bonders” have to say. In the mean time, check out Tanlover’s bonding wedsite http://www.wheekwheekthump.com. She recently moved and is likely still settling in, but I think she pops on and reads occasionally.

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