Scrapping Bunnies

Hi,

I have two buns. A buck and a doe. The buck is about 3 and a half months old, and the doe is 4 months old.

Neither have been neutered. We intend to do it, and we and the vet are monitoring them to confirm when they are ready to be neutered.

Anyway, they're not siblings, but have been together since 8 weeks. And together with us for a further 6 weeks.

All this time they have got along fine.

This morning I went into the hutch to find clumps of fluff scattered around. Whilst they were in the run today, we saw her chasing him around and around and around, and when she caught him, she sat directly on top of him and pulled out a clump of fluff with her teeth.

We rushed out and separated them, and they were fine, and getting on well for the next 10 hours or so - then exactly the same thing happened again.

They share a hutch. What should I do? Do they need to be separated? Is this fighting? or playing? Is this unusual?

You really will need to keep these separated until they have both been neutered. If they are not separated you will end up with a litter of babies, that is if your female is not already pregnant and there is a high chance that you could get a really nasty injury to one of them as a result of their fighting.

Once they have both been neutered and they have recovered sufficiently they can be bonded back together. I would suggest leaving it until the female is neutered which can be done in the next 4 = 8 weeks. In the next few weeks the male should be able to be done, he wil remain fertile for approximately 4 weeks following being neutered and kept away from your female until she is done

Both the breeder and the vet have said it's okay to keep them together as long as we keep an eye on them. The vet confirmed yesterday that the buck has not reached puberty.

I do know it's a very tricky balance though.

He's not mature, so she can't be pregnant. Could it be anything else?