When is safe to leave bonded buns together

Just got a new baby rabbit which is about 9 weeks old and a girl(jack).
I already have a neutered male(betty) which is nearly 4 and very tame, but has only had human contact since i got himat 6 weeks old.
Indroduced them to eachother today and got no reaction at all from betty, she just wanted to see what food i'd brought in for her, she is always begging from me. she sniffed jack but just carried on her own business. Jack did a little samp but she is so small i dont think betty noticed.
It seemed like jack was a bit scared and as a i went to pick her up she jumped into bettys food bowl which she still had her head in and still no reaction what so ever.
we are going to do some more bonding with them while we are present but i just want to know if all goes well when do you risk leaving them alone??

Hi, it is wise to bond using NEUTRAL territory rather than simply putting one bun in the other's cage. It is not until they have spent an entire day together in this neutral territory without any aggression or fighting, and if possible, with some mutual grooming involved, that they should be left overnight together, preferrably in a newly cleaned hutch so it is also relatively neutral. Feigned indifference is a good sign but does not necessarily mean that the buns are fully bonded at this stage.
With the unneutered bunny you are going to have issues until he/she is neutered (I'm sorry i'm a bit confused...Jack is female and Betty is male?? :?). It is unlikely that they will remain bonded when the baby unneutered bun reaches sexual maturity in a few weeks time most likely. 12 wks +. Whether it be male or female...hormones kicking in are very likely to disrupt the bond and could lead to fighting. For this reason you may be better off waiting until your baby bun is old enough to be neutered and begin bonding then instead. Whatever you decide to do just be aware that unless BOTH rabbits are neutered the bond will be fragile and at risk of a fight breaking out.

Yes i know its confusing i always wanted two rabbits, betty and jack.
Got betty and at first thought she was female but was wrong but still gkept it as betty because we wereused to it. so of course i still wanted it to be jack and betty so hence the mix up.
So it is the new bun is the female which is not neutered, male has been neutered years.
do you think this will still effect them?

BettyBunny said:

Yes i know its confusing i always wanted two rabbits, betty and jack.
Got betty and at first thought she was female but was wrong but still gkept it as betty because we wereused to it. so of course i still wanted it to be jack and betty so hence the mix up.
So it is the new bun is the female which is not neutered, male has been neutered years.
do you think this will still effect them?

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Yes. Unspayed does are highly territorial and can be quite tempremental and aggressive towards other rabbits. It is likely that her hormones when they kick in will interfere with any bonding attempt, or break a bond futher down the line. Aside from this, it is really important that you have her spayed when she is old enough 4-6 months, as Uterine and Ovarian cancers are extremely common in unspayed does over the age of 4 yrs - incidence of around 80% of them develop cancer. Therefore spaying is essential to protect her life into her latter years of 4+. Buns can live up to age 10+ so it is really important.

Prettylupin has given you some excellent advice, however in my experience bonding a baby girl with a neutered male has been very successful.

Yes you do need to keep a close eye on your girl and as soon as she displays hormonal behaviour get her spayed.... but I have done two instant love bonds this way. It depends how experienced you are with spotting hormonal changes.

When I bonded my first bun with Dasiy she was un-neutered as only 8wks - he loved her instantly and they were inseperable At about 16wks she started nesting and I knew it was time for her spay. For me this went well - even though I kept her quarrantined in a cage (both were free range house bunnies) My boy Gabe sat next to the cage and watched over her and re-intorduction was a love affair !! I will say this is rare and you may have to re-bond... just be aware of the facts

Good Luck :wave:

Oh and change their names over :lol::lol::lol::lol:

Thanks, its good to hear another success story.
They have been together for a few hours tonigh while we watched them, although there has been a little bit of chasing it looked to be either playfull or just trying to smell eachother. by the end of the night betty was licking jacks ears and they were sitting very close to each other.
It did look at points like betty wanted to hump jack but i didn't think he would do this after been neutered for so long??

Sorry i cant change to names because betty knows her name too well, she has lived in the house with me since been 6 weeks old and is now coming on 4, it just wouldn't be right

can anyone confirm when they think it is safe for rabbits to stay together un watched,
I have re arranged the whole living area for them so that they both are in new territory although i have a divide for the area so i can separate them, there are two bowls and two water bottles and also two litter tray as one is tiny and the other massive.
I have let them both into this area without the divide and they seem really happy. up to now they have;
Layed with each other
been eating out of the same bowl at the same time
playing in and out of a t shaped tube together (which has been my orginal rabbits for a long time)
my orginal rabbit has been licking the new rabbits head but not the other way round yet.

I just can't find a reason to seperate them again at the moment, can anyone help on this

BettyBunny said:

can anyone confirm when they think it is safe for rabbits to stay together un watched,
I have re arranged the whole living area for them so that they both are in new territory although i have a divide for the area so i can separate them, there are two bowls and two water bottles and also two litter tray as one is tiny and the other massive.
I have let them both into this area without the divide and they seem really happy. up to now they have;
Layed with each other
been eating out of the same bowl at the same time
playing in and out of a t shaped tube together (which has been my orginal rabbits for a long time)
my orginal rabbit has been licking the new rabbits head but not the other way round yet.

I just can't find a reason to seperate them again at the moment, can anyone help on this

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As I said earlier - once they have spent atleast an entire day together in perfect companionship with no aggression etc....then they should be ok to leave overnight but the shared accomodation will need to be neutralised first to prevent any territorial flare ups.
As I also said before you are going to need to be extra vigilant having one 'unneutered' baby bun and keep watch for the hormones kicking in.

Well i decided to leave them over night because there was just no aggression ever and they have been together since about 3pm yesterday and i'm happy to say that they lovvveeee eachother. Although i think jack is going to pick up bettys bad begging habbits quicker than i expected
About the un neutered one......why will it cause a problem?? am really not sure of the answer so will be helpfull to know.

Thing is i used to keep rabbits before i got betty at my mums house and i had a garage that was about 8ftx8ft and the ajoined run about 8ftx20ft. The buns slept in the garage area during the night and unless it was really cold they would be in the run during the day. I had loads of different hutchs inside so they could choose where to sleep.
I started of with 1 bun (benjiman) a male un neutered and then got an adult male (eddie)again un neutered that someone was giving away, then joel and lilly an already bonded pair with the male neutered and litterally i just stuck them all together. I carried on taking rabbits in like this with no problems, i think because i was young it just didn't occur to me that there would be a problem.
And there never was... i had males, females, babys been born and growing up around them and all was just happy. I dont get it!!! I just used to sell the babys unless there was one that was just a bit different that i wanted to keep. so i problerly had about 30 permanent rabbits altogether that were toltally mixed and never had any fights. I understand the space may make a difference but really that much???

Sorry for the long post but i really need to get to the bottom of this because i'd like jack to have at least 1 litter and i expect betty to be a good dad due to previous experiance :shock:

I thought Betty (male) was neutered (?) so he will be unable to be a "Dad".

Yeh is, will be step dad!
I have a friend with a male lionhead that i hope will mate

Ah! That's a shame - you see there are already more than 30,000 unwanted rabbits waiting in rescues for loving homes.

well i already have 1 person lined up for at least 1 bun and that is my friend with the male,she especially wants a grey bun the same as mine so it makes sense, i will be keeping two of them
But they are small rabbits and for her first litter i would only expect a max of four baby's and if so wouldn't need to sell any i 'd just keep tham

Oh dear What a shame you can not reconsider and not bring more rabbits into this world when so many are sat waiting in rescues for homes

Really, if you don't understand the basics of rabbit behaviour such as why an unspayed doe will eventually fight with a neutered buck....then it doesn't sound like you know enough to be breeding rabbits full stop! :shock:

I am afraid I have to agree with prettylupin.

It is not a good idea to breed from your female. Do you have any idea of her breeding or family history. For all you know you could be breeding from a line of rabbits with health problems. Breeding should be left to the experts, not backyard breeders.

There are more than enough unwanted rabbits looking for loving homes without more being unnecessarily bred just because people want 'baby bunnies'!

I work with rescued rabbits and the number of unwanted pet rabbits is unreal, most of the rabbits I look after have been bought as babies because they are 'cute' and 2 years down the line when the kids have lost interest, or they haven't died yet, because of course rabbits only live for 2 years :?, they come into the sanctuary where they spend months or even years looking for homes. It really is sad.

Cerys

Ok well if you read the experiance that i have had in the past with breeding them and not having any problems obviously that is why i am asking.
I can understand where people are coming from in a way but what do they do in the wild?
And i don't think that i am neglecting the fact that there are alot of buns waiting in rescue homes, if you read my post about the experiance of bunnys all of them came from unwanted homes. i would look through the paper etc and take anything that was going, and i mean anything i've has 5 sheep, loads of birds all various varietys in the avoriy now (none have been bought)
4 rescue dogs, 2 cats, a depressed african grey, hamsters and gineau pigs. am sure theres more just cant remember right now.
I took the advantage of the room i had and did right for alot of animals and gave them what i feel to be a much better life than they had before.

I'm i bit offended that people on here can just jump to conclusions.....do you even know where i got my current buns from???
All i'm doing is breeding them to keep not to sell.

Maybe i shouldn't have children of my own because i'm sure there are hundereds of thousands of children in the world i could adopt instread????

So does anyone no whats going to happen is the female is not neutered? i.e past experiance good/bad thanks

for the record i have never given up a pet, nor have i ever bought on a whim.
I never want my buns to die but you are right i love the babys but i also love the older ones

If they are rescue buns how could you possibly know their genetic history several generations back in order to protect the babies you intend to breed from congenital defects? :?

I'm sorry you feel judged but it does seem that if you need to ask 'why' your unspayed doe will have issues with her neutered partner when she reaches sexual maturity....that despite your 'breeding experience' you are not all that knowledgeable about rabbits?! :? Breeding buns is a complicated and serious issue aside from the moral perspective.
Do you have sufficient housing within the min size recommendations for each and every offspring? What if she produces twice the number of kits you are expecting? This would mean an awful lot of 6ftx2ft hutches for each 'unneutered' kit that reaches sexual maturity as well.

This is largely a 'rescue' forum. I suggest if you are serious about breeding you might find a more compassionate response from a different forum. But please please reconsider....if your buns are rescues....have they not been through enough already?

To be honest I think every post in here is just judged straight away, when i said about 'my experiance' i dont mean i know every thing i mean what has happened to me and then so is my experiance. i.e in my experiance my females have got on fine with the males throughout there life. in someonce else experiance the females decided the didn't like the males anymore etc etc.
But i still don't know what those experiances are, i find there alot of people on here that will say things like 'they cannot be kept together if not neutered' or 'if your experianced enough with spotting hormonal behaviour you will know when to neuter' but they never acually give any info about it. i.e like now, cant anyone tell me what is going to happen if i dont neuter her?? or behaviour to look out for???
My buns live in a garage joined to the house while i'm out which at a guess in about 6m by 4m....bigger than a car anyway!! and then when am in they have free choice to come out or not, i think this is enough space to have more buns

BettyBunny said:

cant anyone tell me what is going to happen if i dont neuter her?? or behaviour to look out for???

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Quite simply - No. It's impossible to give an exact answer to a question that could have a multitude of outcomes? All that we know is that due to instinctive rabbit behaviour gathered from people with years of experience and from those who have spent their lives researching and observing rabbits in the wild - it is likely that when she reaches sexual maturity - if you don't pick up on the signs....which again can be numerous and take experience to recognise - that the bond between her and her neutered male partner may break, and then again it may not. Experience tells us that the former is more likely. There are no hard and fast rules with rabbits, it is dependent on personality and many other factors. But you do need to be prepared for this and accept that it is a likely possibility.

When the kits reach 10-12 wks of age - they too will need to be separated from the different sexes and possibly their siblings as well - due to unneutered group fighting risks - fighting rabbits can cause serious injury and will mean a larger vet bill for you. This is the reason I am suggesting that you will be likely to need adequate accomodation for each individual bunny until you can afford to neuter each of these. Bearing in mind that most vets will not spay a doe until she is between 4-6 months of age - but preceding this time she could be fighting with her unspayed siblings and would need separating.

Look I am no expert on this - I freely admit this. Hopefully tomorrow someone with a bit more experience on these issues will come along and explain this better to you.