• Forum/Server Upgrade If you are reading this you have made it to the upgraded forum. Posts made on the old forum after 26th October 2023 have not been transfered. Everything else should be here. If you find any issues please let us know.

Broken bonds - your exerience & advice please

J

Julia123

Warren Veteran
Hiya

I currently have my 'love at first sight' pair of bunnies living next to each other in pens in my spare room. They fell out when Gabriel went into stasis - Daisy kept attacking him and he was so poorly and lifeless I had to separate. When I tried to get them back together after 48 hours they started to fight again, so i left it another 12 hours and seemed to be going well until I turned my back for 30 secs and they were locked onto each other going crazy! I managed to get Daisy out, but she had two huge tears in her ear. I had to take her to emergency vets for surgery. She came through ok and her ear has been saved. The wounds are healing and I think it will be about another 2 weeks at least before its safe to try and re-bond - but I'm oh so scared !!!

Anyone else had any similar experiences???? I had a broken bond pair before and never managed to get them back together :cry:

PS Daisy has turned into a nutter now and grunts and charges me whenever i go near and Gabriel is just depressed :cry::cry: They were used to free range of the house before...:cry::cry:
 
I know this is not what you want to hear but personally there is absolutely no way I would attempt a re-bond after such a serious fight :(

Sorry :cry:
 
Jack's-Jane said:
I know this is not what you want to hear but personally there is absolutely no way I would attempt a re-bond after such a serious fight :(

Sorry :cry:
Click to expand...

The emergency vet said the same thing :cry::cry::cry: They were just sooooo loved up before I just don't understand it :cry::cry::cry:

There is no sign of agression between the bars where they both are now and they do sit next to each other on either side......
 
I wouldn't re-bond either. More often than not in my experience when a bond as broken down it very seldom fixes:cry:
 
Julia, As I have said to you before, I had this with Amber & Timmy.
It wa VERY SERIOUS & ended in both bunnies being injuried
(Amber came off the worst) I decided I would have to re home Timmy because I couldnt keep two individual giants,

Timmy now has a great home with Kayj & David :D

He has bonded with Branston & Mayo perfectly........ :?

Some bunnies can be so loved up then can never re bond.

ETA....... :wave: Kayj! :lol:
 
Julia123 said:
The emergency vet said the same thing :cry::cry::cry: They were just sooooo loved up before I just don't understand it :cry::cry::cry:

There is no sign of agression between the bars where they both are now and they do sit next to each other on either side......
Click to expand...


Well why not let them remain friends but just divided by the bars :)
 
I was sending telepathic messages to timmy cos i wanted him though:lol::lol:

only kidding:D
 
Very sorry to hear about your situation. It's horrendous seeing two lovely buns scrapping like crazy. We had a similar scenario with our previous bun family where two sisters (dwarf lionheads) who'd been great together for 8 months had to be separated after being neutured when one of them became infected. Daisy, who was the slightly dominant sister, had to be kept indoors for 6 weeks whilst on antibiotics and being hand fed for part of the time. We (and the vets) thought we were going to lose her but it was wonderful to see her getting better and stronger and spending a lot of time with us. When she'd made a full recovery we introduced her back to her sister Candy and all hell broke loose. Daisy wasn't at full strength and the normaly gentile Candy took advantage.
We tried several ideas including:-
a) partitioning the garden and letting them see eachother through the separating wire. They did lean against eachother through the wire and seemed to be at ease but on the one or two occasions we tried to introduce them again all hell broke loose.
b) taking them for car rides. This worked for as long as the journey lasted and maybe two minutes afterwards.
c) taking them to a neutral location - my parents garden. Again the peace lasted for about two minutes.

I can't speak for anyone else but a lot of the replies suggest rabbits can never be re-bonded. But I knew ours had got on brilliantly and I wasn't going to give in without a real good go. Although I didn't want to see the girls fight anymore I also didn't want to have to give one away. The solution that worked... one easter I spent the best part of 3 days with a large water pistol in the garden. Day 1 - whenever they tried to start fighting or even looking like fighting they'd both get a blast and a firm "No". If one appeared to be the aggressor they'd get an extra blast or more. Day 2 - same water pistol routine as day 1 but by the end of the day Candy had started to run away. Day 3 - neighbours convinced I'm a loon BUT it worked! Buns stopped fighting and chasing and were soon grooming eachother. Not text book stuff I admit but it worked for us. Please no one report me to the RSPCA.
 
well the garden is neutral space.......

I think you proably need to give it a go at someone like chloes or my house which they do not recognise at all with lots of well wrapped up people in the room.....possibly with water pistols (maybe one filled with vodka for our own fortification) and you sitting downstairs order the pizza and getting us more vodka (sorry water) trying not to stress out too much. There isn't one room in your house that the bunnies haven't been in & I don't think the bath is going to cut the mustard. If you are going to try again and I think you a car ride together in the same carrier down to solihull is in order.
 
Jack's-Jane said:
I know this is not what you want to hear but personally there is absolutely no way I would attempt a re-bond after such a serious fight :(

Sorry :cry:
Click to expand...

Totally agree, I would NOT try them again because you could never trust them, can't you keep them seperate
 
I wouldn't dare put them in the same carrier, I've seen the damage that can be done in the split second I turned my back :cry: Been thinking long and hard about it tonight and I'm going to set up some more permanent runs with a bit more space for them both and take it from there. I'm in no rush and it will take as long as it takes. I'm currently swapping them over every couple of days and that seems to keep them busy with chinning everything for a few hours, hopefully eventually they won't be able to tell the difference from their own smells.

Thank you all for your replies and I do heed your messages of caution and I'm going to carry on observing them for the next few weeks before making any decisions.

Any more feedback gratefully recieved :D
 
Can't you put one in a trio with the other two and get a new husbun for Daisy, or other way round?
 
Julia123 said:
I wouldn't dare put them in the same carrier, I've seen the damage that can be done in the split second I turned my back :cry: Been thinking long and hard about it tonight and I'm going to set up some more permanent runs with a bit more space for them both and take it from there. I'm in no rush and it will take as long as it takes. I'm currently swapping them over every couple of days and that seems to keep them busy with chinning everything for a few hours, hopefully eventually they won't be able to tell the difference from their own smells.

Thank you all for your replies and I do heed your messages of caution and I'm going to carry on observing them for the next few weeks before making any decisions.

Any more feedback gratefully recieved :D
Click to expand...


You are right and I certainly wouldn't put them in a carrier together and definatley not a bath, I think these methods are nothing short of cruel for the bunnies, can you imagine the stress they must go through
 
Actually Julia, have you spoken to Jane Dexter, she is absolutely brilliant at bonding and judging whether they would bond or not, I have never known her get it wrong, I know she would advise you
 
Snowy said:
Actually Julia, have you spoken to Jane Dexter, she is absolutely brilliant at bonding and judging whether they would bond or not, I have never known her get it wrong, I know she would advise you
Click to expand...

Yes she called me earlier tonight :D hence my decision to watch and learn for a while :D Both Jane and I have a feeling that if its not rushed then it will work... so its the patience game :)

I have used the bath before Theo, put lots of towels in etc purely so I can get to a bun quickly if i need to. It worked well for Bungle and Nushka as it meant they had to interact, but think this may be different and I appreciate your opinion so will try somewhere different if i try again. :wave:
 
Julia123 said:
Yes she called me earlier tonight :D hence my decision to watch and learn for a while :D Both Jane and I have a feeling that if its not rushed then it will work... so its the patience game :)

I have used the bath before Theo, put lots of towels in etc purely so I can get to a bun quickly if i need to. It worked well for Bungle and Nushka as it meant they had to interact, but think this may be different and I appreciate your opinion so will try somewhere different if i try again. :wave:
Click to expand...

Brilliant, I would never use the bath, I really think it's awful but that m opinion, anyway Jane is great at it, good luck!
 
*Spider* said:
Can't you put one in a trio with the other two and get a new husbun for Daisy, or other way round?
Click to expand...

Afraid not - thats why I have 4 :lol: I had a trio with Daisy, Gabriel & Nushka and Daisy & Nushka fell out ! So i had to get a new man for Nushka. So no way of putting Daisy in with Bungle & Nushka as the girls will scrap and Gabriel is a dominant male and so is Bungle and I just would NOT want to see what would happen with Bungle & Gabe (Bungle is conti and Gabe dwarf lop:shock:)

Nice idea though :wave:
 
Snowy said:
Brilliant, I would never use the bath, I really think it's awful but that m opinion, anyway Jane is great at it, good luck!
Click to expand...

Thank you :D I appreciate what you say about the bath and perhaps thats why they kicked off last time - so thanks for that - I won't try it again !!
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Similar threads

J
Advice please
Replies
8
Views
249
Jb31
J
S
My Rabbits broken leg advice
Replies
9
Views
308
Barn Yard Bunnies
Barn Yard Bunnies
R
Bonding Troubles
Replies
2
Views
149
InspectorMorse
InspectorMorse
Back
Top