Professional bunny bonding

[NomadBee]

Hi! We have two rabbits: Hank and Abby. After having Hank for about 8 mos, we added Abby. Both are spayed and neutered. Abby is younger than Hank, but more than year old. Abby is very energetic and binkies and flops a lot. She is skittish about us still, and we are working on establishing a comfort level. She does not accept pets. Hank is the opposite. He bonded with us immediately with lots of licking and bonks. He likes to be near us. 

We took Hank back to the refuge league where we adopted him. We had him pick out his own friend. The lady who helped us said she had never seen two rabbits like each other as immediately as Hank and Abby. Feeling confident, we took Abby home. We started with bathroom dates which went so well! Abby groomed Hank immediately. We put their cages next to each other and kept up with the dating for a few weeks. We then tried to have them both free roaming the living room at the same time. Chasing and boxing suddenly happened. Scared they’d get hurt we separated them again. Next bathroom date, Abby wanted her own bathing and Hank fought her over it. We went to the vet and he said we needed to let them have fur fly until they worked it out, as long as they didn’t cause wounds. I sat with them in a small xpen for most of a day until I couldn’t stand the fur flying anymore. We also stopped the bathroom dates since they only fought.

Now they have their separate cages and are let out individually to exercise, or I have a wall of xpen down the middle of the room so they each have a side. For the last several weeks this has worked without any nipping through the bars, and even an occasional small grooming session. Thinking they are coexisting amiably, we let them out together to see if they would be fine. Immediate fighting!

We have read SO much literature and forum posts on many different sites trying to find a solution. We are getting sad thinking maybe they will never be able to be in the same cage and area. I am wondering about a professional bonder. I would love to have in-home help. However, we live in Maine and I don’t know if such a service is available. Does anyone know, or even know where I may look to find such a person?

Thanks from:

Nomad and Bee, and Hank and Abby.

[JackRabbit]

One of our very own BBers does online bonding via Skype. Web site for bonding and other info is http://www.wheekwheekthump.com

[MoveDiagonally]

I think you still have a good chance at bonding them yourselves if your wanting to give it a try.

To me it sounds like you moved forward a bit too quickly with the living room situation. Separating them when they fight can also cause more fights as they learn that they can get what they want (the other bunny away from them) through violence. I also think your vet game you some pretty poor bonding advice (even good vets might not know much about bonding).

If you’re wanting to attempt it again yourself I would completely start over. Start with short bathroom dates. Instead of separating when they get aggressive try stress bonding them (going for a car ride, putting them in a laundry basket and jostling it, vacuum, ect). Once they get along well in a neutral area move to semi neutral and repeat. Once they get along well enough in semi neutral you can usually move forward to cementing. Cementing is where you deep clean the area that will be their joined home and put them together, 100% supervised, until they do not fight for 24-48 hours. This is the process I have found most effective (I have 5 rabbits bonded together).

If you want to try finding someone to help you bond then I would look into local rescues. Sometimes they provide bonding services.

[JackRabbit]

MD — that’s the part I’ve never understood. How do you supervise 100% for 24-48 hours? What do you do about going to the bathroom? I can see sleeping in the room with them, but sleeping isn’t really supervising them is it? When my girls got into a fight it wasn’t noisy at all, definitely not loud enough to wake anyone. Exactly what do you do?

[MoveDiagonally]

I would sleep next to them and always woke up when they fought. My husband would give me bathroom and shower breaks. You don’t have to be chained to them necessarily. I could go into my bedroom, dining room, and kitchen and still be able to hear or see them.

[NomadBee]

Thank you all for your help! I think we are doing better slowly. i took some of your suggestions. We have thoroughly cleaned the bunny area, and made it so that they both have a side separated by pen fencing. There have been small grooming sessions and a few moments of batting through the wire, but mostly they sit staring at each other. I haven’t separated any fights, but let them decide when they want to move away to corners. That seems to be good! Abby also seems to be accepting me more (I am food source).

We’ll see if we go backwards again, but I am feeling positive!

[Author]

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