My strange rabbit, need some help/advice

[BaileysMama]

Alright. So I’ve owned my first rabbit for about 6 months now, and I’m definitely not familiar with all the bunny cues and language yet. However I have read up quite a lot and my bun has some behaviors I can’t seem to figure out. 

1. Digs at everything. Clothes, her home, floor, furniture. It’s generally never destructive but I have no idea what she is really doing.  She will dig pat out the area sometimes too in a sort of kneading motion before she digs…

2. Still pees on furniture. Even though she is spayed and litter trained, she will sort of randomly pee on furniture. Like once a week it happens, not sure why. 

3. She is a biter… I think. Often we’ll pet her for a while and and she’ll indicate she’s done with us. And she starts to walk away, but as soon as we move our hands or change position, she lunges and almost every time, draws blood. It’s really painful. She’s actually attacked my roommate viciously twice or so. It’s really scary when she does. And there is usually no precursor. I really would like this to stop but I have no idea why she does it, it just seems she does it when she feels like it. She actually bit my mom last night and drew blood. It was my moms first real time petting her and that’s what she does..

Anyway please I could use any advice

[BunnyLady1989]

From my personal experience, the digging doesn’t ever end. You just need to encourage her to dig on appropriate things such as a grass mat or cardboard.
The potty issues are alittle more difficult. They are more likely to wet on things that are soft, such as your bed or couch. Lulu is like that and she isn’t allowed there for that very reason.
As for the biting maybe it could be that she is still telling you she needs her space? Unfortunately I’m not an expert these are just my own thoughts from personal experience. I hope something I said helps you though!

[BaileysMama]

Haha okay, well fortunately the digging is never destructive so I can deal with that. And soft things… Hmm! That would make sense. Yeah the biting thing…

[Slowebot]

Some bunnies just like to dig, you can look up toys for your bunny like diggy boxes. It’s basically just a box or a laundry basket with hay or shredded paper in it that a bunny will hang out in and alleviate digging needs. The patting and the digging are both normal behaviors, if you watch videos of bunnies digging holes they like to dig out the dirt then flatten out piles they make. It’s good she isn’t being destructive though, so the box isn’t a necessity, but it’d probably be really cute to watch.

My bunny tends to pee on anything that smells heavily of me, so the couch, my bed (so so so much) and heavier clothing items like jackets. That behavior doesn’t seem to go away even with altering, I think the bunny smells so much of your scent and they want to add their own because they think you’ve been scenting things territorially or something along their lines. They think its totally necessary and normal and aren’t doing it maliciously. My bun always acts super proud of himself after peeing on my bed like “mom look, I put my scent on the bed too! Our scents are mingling!” and he hops around after me lovingly. The only way I’ve been successful at preventing this behavior is just keeping him off the bed and couches. And hanging my jackets.

The biting is strange though, the fact that she lashes out after being affectionate doesn’t make me think she’s trying to be aggressive, there must be a miscommunication between you two. I wonder if your movements are by chance taking her by surprise, like if she has bad vision or hearing. The only thing I can suggest is to maybe make every move super deliberate, give a vocal warning, slow exaggerated movements and make sure she sees you. The situation is so strange and unfortunate but I really hope you can figure out something that works for both of you!

Good luck!

[BaileysMama]

Thank you so much for your input!

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