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Bolt and Kiwi bonding

Bolt

Young Bun
Hi guys,

Right, though it wasnt my idea, my OH wanted to see bolt and kiwi together so i brought her over. We havent started the bonding stage yet.

Bolt got castrated and its been 2-3 weeks and bolt ios 1 years old, kiwi is 11 weeks old, shes not spayed yet.

Bolt seems to be interested in kiwi, kiwi wasnt so much interested at first, i think thats becauses hes only just getting use to me and my house, now shes over at my OH's house so prob nosying about.

Bolt on the other hand hopped out of his cage, sniffed kiwi and started licking her, to me it looked like he was bout to mount her, my OH picked him up and i wasnt comfortable with bolt having contact with kiwi anyway.

So when my OH picked him up, he had a erected 'you know what' which was about 2.5cm long lol

What does this all mean? of course they will not be in contact until i say so, my OH gets excited but now she says she a little disgusted with bolt's behaviour lol (her fault for wanting them 2 to meet).

How long should we wait before we actually start the bonding stage? Shes not spayed yet, is she old enough to be spayed as i want to get her spayed before they start meeting properly

any advice would be appreciated, i dont want bolt to keep humping her, would he calm down later or does he just need to get it out of this system? I dont want bolt to hurt kiwi if you know what i mean :(

thanks
 
any advice guys?

bolt seems to want to mate with kiwi, should we let them and see if it calms him down?

he was recently castrated 3 weeks ago, kiwi is not spayed yet.

i'm worried he might hurt her and they may fight
 
I'm not 100% sure (someone who is will be along soon) but I think he may still be fertile so soon after his op. I would keep them apart for a few more weeks or until she is speyed.
 
from my understanding, he can still be fertile up to 6 weeks after his neuter, so definately keep them seperated til then :)

Also, from understanding, not experience, she can be spayed from about the age she is now, aslong as she is a good weight (1kg i think it is?) and the vet is rabbit savvy.

Experts may correct me, but thats just from reading on here for the last 2 months :)
 
what about bolt's urge to hump kiwi?

would he still want to hump her in say 3-4 weeks time when i start the bonding? if so should i let him just do it? bearing in mind kiwi would be spayed by then?

cheers
 
It can take around 8 weeks, sometimes more, for their hormones to die right down. Mounting is part of the bonding process with some rabbits anyway. It's not just for mating, it's also to establish dominance.
 
http://forums.rabbitrehome.org.uk/showthread.php?p=3987218#post3987218

looking at her size and the fact how long you have had her, I think your being a bit unfair on this bunny, she is too young to deal with an adult buck.

Why didn't you stick to your original plan of waiting for at least 2 weeks? Even that is too soon - she hasn't had any vacs yet either has she?:?

Wow i didn't realise how small she was. Keep her well clear of him untill all ops are done and she's bigger. He could seriously hurt her :(
 
Wow i didn't realise how small she was. Keep her well clear of him untill all ops are done and she's bigger. He could seriously hurt her :(

Yes exactly what I was thinking, she is too young to defend herself if he did get a bit over the top which it sounds like he is - constant mounting by an adult rabbit is actually dangerous I think for a baby apart from the stress factor and the tiring aspect of it he could physically hurt her back etc her bones are still soft and developing.
 
going from what you guys have said i am reliefed as i didnt want to bond them so quick anyway.

she is going for jabs and spay very soon, them 2 live in different houses anyway, i have kiwi at mine and OH has bolt.

once the jabs and spay is done and shes recovered from all that, i'm guessing she'll be 6 months old, i'll reassess then.

thanks for your comment everyone, i will update here if something changes
 
going from what you guys have said i am reliefed as i didnt want to bond them so quick anyway.

she is going for jabs and spay very soon, them 2 live in different houses anyway, i have kiwi at mine and OH has bolt.

once the jabs and spay is done and shes recovered from all that, i'm guessing she'll be 6 months old, i'll reassess then.

thanks for your comment everyone, i will update here if something changes

No worries, better to be safe than sorry, it's too late when it's happened, adult rabbits don't see 'baby' ones as special in the sense he will just treat her like any other doe, she is far too small and fragile to cope with him doing what bucks do I think, I think waiting is a pain but, much more sensible, you could try housing them side by side in the meantime which is nice for both of them, providing he can't get to her to nose nip or anything she will find his prescense comforting and they can used to each other smells, movements, sounds etc :wave:
 
you cant see the size difference very well but i think bolt weighs just over twice kiwi's weight.

Kiwi eats loads and she drinks loads, she eats all the hay i give her, even her bedding hay, all the food in her bowl too and drink more water than bolt! I think she'll be his size very soon, probably even bigger than bolt once she becomes an adult!

IMG_0929.jpg
 
you cant see the size difference very well but i think bolt weighs just over twice kiwi's weight.

Kiwi eats loads and she drinks loads, she eats all the hay i give her, even her bedding hay, all the food in her bowl too and drink more water than bolt! I think she'll be his size very soon, probably even bigger than bolt once she becomes an adult!

IMG_0929.jpg

She does look bigger in that picture than on your other thread, I hope he didn't catch her and she isn't pregnant !
 
no, they both were constantly supervised, then only spend 5 mins together whilst bolt was sniffing her most of the time.

we called it quits and put bolt back in his cage so theres no way he could of mounted her.

then the rest of the evening bolt stayed in his cage and kiwi in hers.
 
just an update, Kiwi is going for a spay this weekend as she got the greenlight from the vets in her pre-op check.

Bolt has been neutered for approximately 4-5 weeks but he still wants to hump Kiwi, we seperate them so they arent in contact but their cages are next to each other. They both seem to be ok with each other whilst bolt just wants to mount her.

When bolt had his op, they only found 1 ballbag which was larger than usual and they couldnt find the other. Do make rabbits still want to hump even after their neutered?? or could it be theres still another testicle left somewhere?

Once Kiwi has her op, i'll wait about 3-4 weeks before the inevitable bonding contact and i'm guessing bolt will prob hump her and theres nothing we can do but to watch?

any advise it welcome!

PS: Kiwi is quite different compared to Bolt, she runs around alot, makes more noise with her noise, eats more, poops more and seems to have alot of energy!
 
just an update, Kiwi is going for a spay this weekend as she got the greenlight from the vets in her pre-op check.

Bolt has been neutered for approximately 4-5 weeks but he still wants to hump Kiwi, we seperate them so they arent in contact but their cages are next to each other. They both seem to be ok with each other whilst bolt just wants to mount her.

When bolt had his op, they only found 1 ballbag which was larger than usual and they couldnt find the other. Do make rabbits still want to hump even after their neutered?? or could it be theres still another testicle left somewhere?

Once Kiwi has her op, i'll wait about 3-4 weeks before the inevitable bonding contact and i'm guessing bolt will prob hump her and theres nothing we can do but to watch?

any advise it welcome!

PS: Kiwi is quite different compared to Bolt, she runs around alot, makes more noise with her noise, eats more, poops more and seems to have alot of energy!

Could be a non-descended testicle. I'd be worried about putting them together until a vet had confirmed there was not a 2nd one, which i'd be very concerned about personally and from experiences i've read on RU. If he's still very humpy, it may just be him saying "im the bigger bun here!" but if not 100% neutered, it could be that also.

Experts around?
 
The vet said they tried looking but couldnt find it, they didnt want to keep bolt sleeping for too long. He recovered fine.

When he wants to hump kiwi, if we lift him up, he can see this 'pee pee', would this be dominance or lust?? He tried to hump her face a few times so would this be dominance?

I noticed that he bit her hair once when he tried to hump her but he didnt get to do it cos we seperate them as soon as he tried it on, but is the biting/holding their fur normal during mating?

Kiwi doesnt seem fussed at all, she just hops and plays on her own carefree.
 
The vet said they tried looking but couldnt find it, they didnt want to keep bolt sleeping for too long. He recovered fine.

When he wants to hump kiwi, if we lift him up, he can see this 'pee pee', would this be dominance or lust?? He tried to hump her face a few times so would this be dominance?

I noticed that he bit her hair once when he tried to hump her but he didnt get to do it cos we seperate them as soon as he tried it on, but is the biting/holding their fur normal during mating?

Kiwi doesnt seem fussed at all, she just hops and plays on her own carefree.


Yes it's normal

Is Kiwi spayed now?

I would avoid subjecting her to this unless you are ready to properly bond & leave them together.
 
Kiwi is going to be spayed this weekend

so which part of the humping is normal? i.e. is he humping because of dominance or because theres still a hidden testicle left??

once kiwi is spayed, we'll wait a few weeks then we will let them start bonding properly.

At the moment they are in their seperate cages, but the cages are next to each other, sometimes they try to 'kiss' through the cage lol

Guess once the op is over and we've waited, we'll have to watch him hump her then :(

PS: The end result which we're hoping is for them 2 to live and play together peacefully

How long does it generally take for them to bond properly, i.e. how long before we can stop watching them 2 alone
 
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