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When would you be concerned? Spayed bunny acting unspayed!

Liz47

Wise Old Thumper
I hope this is ok in rabbit chat, I'm hoping for some more opinions as many don't visit behaviour and bonding section.

Bigwig is just over 1 and was spayed in January this year. Around February she was bonded with my 5 year old neutered pair Jake and Jasmine. It was quite an easy bond. Before that she was kept in our kitchen and never showed any hormonal/destructive behaviour and was very friendly, I hand reared her from approx 10 days old with her siblings who I rehomed.

Since moving up to the rabbit room, she became quite destructive and needs a lot of enrichment. She likes forage/dig activities and gets a rotation of various toys each day. Jake and Jasmine are very laid back and spend most of the day eating hay in their crate or snoozing on the rug. Bigwig has been through a phase of bullying, chasing them both away from the pellets and lunging when they jump out the trays. Mainly focused on Jasmine who is the most reserved. She has stopped this now and all if well but she is very destructive. She's chewed through the lino which was put down the protect the carpet, ripped all the carpet and underlay so there's big bare patches. She's chewed the skirting board too. She occasionally lunges at us, particularly around food, or when we try and stop her getting out the room/under our bed!

She built a nest a few months ago and today I've heard her being very noisy and when checking on her she had hay, shredded carpet and bits of the rug in her mouth, and has built a huge nest behind her soil dig box. I've removed it but she's started again with hay.

Sorry for the long post! Can this just be her behaviour or would you go through the route of getting her tested for any hormonal imbalances/left over spay tissue??
 
I hope this is ok in rabbit chat, I'm hoping for some more opinions as many don't visit behaviour and bonding section.

Bigwig is just over 1 and was spayed in January this year. Around February she was bonded with my 5 year old neutered pair Jake and Jasmine. It was quite an easy bond. Before that she was kept in our kitchen and never showed any hormonal/destructive behaviour and was very friendly, I hand reared her from approx 10 days old with her siblings who I rehomed.

Since moving up to the rabbit room, she became quite destructive and needs a lot of enrichment. She likes forage/dig activities and gets a rotation of various toys each day. Jake and Jasmine are very laid back and spend most of the day eating hay in their crate or snoozing on the rug. Bigwig has been through a phase of bullying, chasing them both away from the pellets and lunging when they jump out the trays. Mainly focused on Jasmine who is the most reserved. She has stopped this now and all if well but she is very destructive. She's chewed through the lino which was put down the protect the carpet, ripped all the carpet and underlay so there's big bare patches. She's chewed the skirting board too. She occasionally lunges at us, particularly around food, or when we try and stop her getting out the room/under our bed!

She built a nest a few months ago and today I've heard her being very noisy and when checking on her she had hay, shredded carpet and bits of the rug in her mouth, and has built a huge nest behind her soil dig box. I've removed it but she's started again with hay.

Sorry for the long post! Can this just be her behaviour or would you go through the route of getting her tested for any hormonal imbalances/left over spay tissue??
I'm no expert, hopefully someone else can weigh in.. But Clementine suffers with phantom pregnancies, and when she's having one, will do absolutely everything to acquire nesting materials and build her nest. But when it's over (can take days) she's much more settled and content and a normal bun.. So it's not quite the same as Bigwig by the sounds of it..

I'd probably take her to a vet to discuss, but for Clementine it's only when she's nesting it's a problem, I hate watching it tbh it breaks my heart and she wears herself out.. But it's only a few times a year, and she's fine the rest of the time.. If it was all the time I think I'd be discussing with my Vet :)

Hopefully someone with more knowledge on options can help x

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I have no experience of this - but would be inclined to leave her nest alone when she has built it in case removing it made her anxious.
I'm sure someone else will be more help.
 
I have no experience of this - but would be inclined to leave her nest alone when she has built it in case removing it made her anxious.
I'm sure someone else will be more help.
Oh yea, we always leave Clementines nests, and give her a lot of space when it's happening, don't really change anything, sometimes we leave her litter tray an extra day because she's not really herself and she gets worried and stressed with changes when it's happening.

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Thank you. I think I'll book her in on Tuesday (my day off) see what the vet says. We left her first nest so she wouldn't get distressed but since it contains threads/bits of carpet Jake was in it eating the hay but also eating strands of carpet too!! This one was mostly carpet/chunks of rug so I didn't want to risk any of them getting a blockage from it. She isn't bothered by Jake being in it/eating it, I've left the hay she's put their since bless her. The first nest she built was quite soon after her spay, perhaps a month.

ETA: I hadn't thought of spayed bunnies experiencing phantom pregnancies, poor Clementine!
 
Thank you. I think I'll book her in on Tuesday (my day off) see what the vet says. We left her first nest so she wouldn't get distressed but since it contains threads/bits of carpet Jake was in it eating the hay but also eating strands of carpet too!! This one was mostly carpet/chunks of rug so I didn't want to risk any of them getting a blockage from it. She isn't bothered by Jake being in it/eating it, I've left the hay she's put their since bless her. The first nest she built was quite soon after her spay, perhaps a month.

ETA: I hadn't thought of spayed bunnies experiencing phantom pregnancies, poor Clementine!
Oh yea if it'd been carpet I would've removed too. Clementine once stole a new kitchen roll to use as nesting material [emoji51]

Did Bigwig ever have these nesting episodes before she was spayed?

Clementine was spayed at about 7months old I think, but she'd started having phantom pregnancies at 14 weeks old [emoji51] my Vet had said he thought they may stop after the spay, but they didn't. When she lived with Atticus she used to get very upset if he ate her nests [emoji51][emoji38]

I hope your vet can help, it may just be she's a very destructive rabbit? And the nesting thing compounds the situation? [emoji51][emoji38]

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Thank you. She never had any nesting or hormonal behaviours before she was spayed :/

Aww yeah I don't blame Clementine getting upset at her nest being eaten, I'm surprised Bigwig doesn't chase Jake away!! Bigwig was about 6/7 months when spayed. She has always been very confident personality wise
 
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