Tough Choice to make

[cornflakes]

I’ve been caring for quite a few rabbits over the last few years.

They would just come and go after being better but I’ve kept two of them for a while.

One is about 3 years old.  I’ve known her since birth but at that time was not in my care.  I only

took her in after she was about 1.5 years old when she needed rescuing.  She’s calmer and has a bit

of a picky personality, but she likes to be rubbed, not held.

The other one is about 7 months old now, and I rescued her when she was only 3 days old.  Her mom abandoned her

and so I had to learn how to hand feed and hand raise a bunny.  Luckily we made it through after hand feeding her twice

a day and seeing her grow up in my care.  She’s more active and but she also likes to be rubbed and seems a little more

innocent/domesticated since she was raised with me, but she’s a lot more active and chews things.

I have to give one of them away now.  I can only keep one.  Which one do u think I should keep?  I like them both

very much, but it’s a hard choice.

[Azerane]

We really can’t make this choice for you. The only way for us to make a choice is to decide based on the information you’ve provided, which doesn’t tell us everything about each rabbit, and on top of that, we’re not the ones keeping the rabbit, you are. It’s really an impossible decision and I’m sure whichever way you choose you will always miss the other bunny.

I’d like to objectively say keep the bunny that you’ve had the longest, but I’m well aware that it’s just really not that simple. Wishing you the best.

[Bam]

As Azerane says, we can’t tell you which one to keep. My heart says to keep the one you’ve had for the longest time, but I think really the most important thing to consider is the destiny of the bunny that gets given away. A younger bun is more likely to be adopted by someone else if you are considering surrendering one to a shelter. It’s also easier for a younger bun to adjust to a new environment.

Is there really no way you can keep both? (I feel I should ask.)

[cornflakes]

yes, i know that only i can really make this decision myself. It’s just nice to hear whatever feedback comes my way because it may give me some insights to consider things I have yet to think about.

Yes, I do want to keep both, and I might try to, but the problem is they don’t get along. They are both females and even when I put them next to each other by cage and months later, they still aren’t friendly. Mostly the older female is the one that does the attacking, maybe because she was jealous knowing that I was giving more attention to the baby rabbit I was raising for the first couple months by hand, then later when she got older I moved her out of my room and into a cage. Just the other day, the older rabbit got a good bite out of the other’s lower lip when she put her face between the bars of the cage. It’s a pretty bad cut and her lower lip is partially torn now…..not sure how that will heal. I really like both of them as I’ve had one longer than the other, BUT I hand raised and hand fed the younger bunny so I almost feel like she’s my own baby. She’s also more affectionate with me, but wild and active too. The older one has always been sort of withdrawn personality, picky, but she’s very calm and mature….I used not even use a cage with her because she was disciplined that I could leave her in an open tent and go to work and come back hours later and she’d still stay in the open area. She would never go around causing mischief like chewing on wires or scratching the corners. She just lay around and only sparingly visited beyond her area only to return within a couple minutes. But she has started to have some wettish poop so that’s when I put her back in a cage so her wettish poop isn’t sticking everywhere on the ground.

[cornflakes]

The other thing is, I cant let them both out….i can let one out, but not the other….so what often happens is I only play with one (the younger one) while the older one, who has been with me longer, gets neglected and I feel bad too cuz I want to let her out also like she used to always be free and roam around my place. The fact that if I keep them both, I have to do twice as much work and twice as much time to supervise their free time….but I really don’t have time for that anymore and it’s just hard to do everything separately and twice. If they got along and could just stay together, I would only have to do everything once (clean one area, instead of two, have one play time instead of two, cuts my time in half, etc.).

[tobyluv]

You didn’t mention if they were spayed or not. Unspayed rabbits will fight and should not be put together. If they are not spayed, can you do so, then try to bond them, so that you can keep them both?

[LBJ10]

I agree with tobyluv’s suggestion.

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