Why is he scratching her?

[skibunny8503]

I thought we were making progress last night because they were so good but today we went backwards and both were mounting each other.  Archie was being violent when grooming her back, nussling his nose into her fur and a few times he scratched her, almost like he was digging or something.  Is this normal?  So far it’s been by her stomach and her behind.  We try to stop him when he starts to do that and tell him no.  We seperated them back into their cages because that was the 3rd time he did that today.

[BinkyBunny]

yes, that is normal, but it is good that you stopped him as that is one way to really make the other bunny mad. When Jack was first bonding, he would actually pull out Rucy’s whiskers, and he would nip at her behind to make her move so he could get into a position to mount her. He had some very “rude” manners.

Mounting is normal too. Doesn’t mean they are going backwards – it means they are going forward with establishing who is boss. The key is to make sure they don’t fight when one is being mounted. It’s okay for one to mount the other as long as the other doesn’t fight back.

What does the bunny that’s being mounted do exactly? Eventually one of them will have to accept the passive role for this to work but that doesn’t mean they both won’t first try the dominant role.

[skibunny8503]

Thanks!  Yeah it looked like it would make her mad.  When Archie mounts usually Gracie just lays there but sometimes she runs away and when Gracie mounts Archie he freaks out and runs away and then they circle a bit.

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