Ears back and grunting?

Some of u may have read about my new female bunny Heidi...

When I got her, the PAH man was getting her out of the cage and she put her ears back and grunted and kind of rocked on her front paws a bit. Is this just purely territorial behaviour? She was difficult to catch and get in the box, but i knew she wasnt going to be easy to handle so i expected this. However iv never really seen a rabbit put its ears back like her! Is there anything I can do now to change how she feels and reacts? Since she's been home (since last night!) iv only had a couple of little grunts and ears went slightly back for a split second only. Iv just been talking to her and letting her smell me. Tonight after work I went to c her and she was in the bed (iv attached a pet carrier to an open door in the dog crate she's in temporarily) so I opened the door and let her smell me and she let me tickle her head, that's when I got the grunt so I just moved my hand away but then she came out and was sniffing at me and let me stroke her head a little. Then she started eating hay! So should I just carry on doing this so she learns to trust me? She will be spayed hopefully in next couple wks but I am just curious about this behaviour! PAH said she was nervous but I don't think she's nervous, ok so she doesn't want to be handled but I'd say she's a pretty confident young lady actually!! Do u think that her grunting/ears back behaviour can be stopped in time? Thanks for any advice/info :thumb:

I adopted up 2 female buns (3 years old) about a 2 months ago. They were both in the carrier and I put my hand in to stroke them to give them a bit of reassurance and Betty lunged at me and kicked the door so hard that it flew off!! At home she growled and boxed me whenever I went near her head. Had them spayed about 6 weeks ago and the difference has been incredible. She is happier, friendlier and is a real little character now. I thing some females will always be territorial so I keep mine in a large puppy exercise puppy pen with tunnels and toys but nowhere she hide out in and get too bossy over. My last female was amazingly friendly but if she got under the hutch she would growl like mad if i went near her. Betty still growls when I stroke her ears but it's all bluff. No real aggression and she's getting much more used to me. I thing spaying your bun will help but it's probably part of her character and will never completely go away.

Bless her, that's perfectly normal behaviour for an unspayed female rabbit - you often see it early into a bond as well (a good sign to gently lean in and calm the bun down because it shows they are about to attack!) It's probably one of two things, or a combination of both - unspayed female rabbits are territorial and will try and defend their territory to protect their 'nest' (even if they don't have one), and also it is possible that there is an element of fear aggression there. This is learnt behaviour where they attack someone coming towards them, usually out of fear rather than out of complete nastiness, because they have learnt that it makes the person leave them alone and go away. Sometimes also, bunnies with poor eyesight are more likely to do this, because they startle more easily as they haven't seen you coming.

Spaying will deal with the territorial element, it may take a little longer to calm down any fear aggression but I've fostered many buns both male and female who arrive with this sort of problem and they do tend to calm down with a lot of patience, mainly just sitting with them, talking to them and hand feeding, so that they learn that you are nice and they don't need to be afraid of you.

sarahj4644 said:

I adopted up 2 female buns (3 years old) about a 2 months ago. They were both in the carrier and I put my hand in to stroke them to give them a bit of reassurance and Betty lunged at me and kicked the door so hard that it flew off!! At home she growled and boxed me whenever I went near her head. Had them spayed about 6 weeks ago and the difference has been incredible. She is happier, friendlier and is a real little character now. I thing some females will always be territorial so I keep mine in a large puppy exercise puppy pen with tunnels and toys but nowhere she hide out in and get too bossy over. My last female was amazingly friendly but if she got under the hutch she would growl like mad if i went near her. Betty still growls when I stroke her ears but it's all bluff. No real aggression and she's getting much more used to me. I thing spaying your bun will help but it's probably part of her character and will never completely go away.

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Seems like Heidi is quite tame then :lol: thankfully I love her anyway, I don't think she's nasty. It doesn't help that she's in such a small environment at the moment because I have to be quite imposing on the space to feed her etc.

Santa said:

Bless her, that's perfectly normal behaviour for an unspayed female rabbit - you often see it early into a bond as well (a good sign to gently lean in and calm the bun down because it shows they are about to attack!) It's probably one of two things, or a combination of both - unspayed female rabbits are territorial and will try and defend their territory to protect their 'nest' (even if they don't have one), and also it is possible that there is an element of fear aggression there. This is learnt behaviour where they attack someone coming towards them, usually out of fear rather than out of complete nastiness, because they have learnt that it makes the person leave them alone and go away. Sometimes also, bunnies with poor eyesight are more likely to do this, because they startle more easily as they haven't seen you coming.

Spaying will deal with the territorial element, it may take a little longer to calm down any fear aggression but I've fostered many buns both male and female who arrive with this sort of problem and they do tend to calm down with a lot of patience, mainly just sitting with them, talking to them and hand feeding, so that they learn that you are nice and they don't need to be afraid of you.

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Thanks, I don't think shes nasty, she was nesting when she was in the shop but iv put a blanket in her bed rather than hay although she seems to be using it as her toilet so I think I'm going to change it to hay! She's prob desperate for a good run around aswell, she suddenly realised when I opened the cafe door this morning to feed her that it was the exit!! As soon as I get chance I'm going to bunny proof the room and leg her have a run around. Iv been working such long hrs this wk and getting her turned out to be a bit of a rush job! Unfortunately bad timing but she's better than being stuck where she was. Fingers crossed with time, patience and spaying she will calm down. She lunged at me a little this morning as I tried to get her food bowls but I just distracted her and she was fine!

Totally agree with Santa. You have to take into consideration that she may have been handled in the past by people who didn't really love her and they learn to be unfriendly. It will take time and the spaying will help.

tonibun said:

Totally agree with Santa. You have to take into consideration that she may have been handled in the past by people who didn't really love her and they learn to be unfriendly. It will take time and the spaying will help.

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I think she was a PAH bun that got separated because of her temperament so she's never had a home, but the assistant was petrified to get her out for me! He said she's a nightmare when her cafe gets cleaned so I'm guessing some of the staff may have handled her roughly I'm going to set up a pen for her ASAP before I attempt any cage cleaning!