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Bunny injured while bonding - what do i do?

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dwarfflops

New Kit
i am currently on day 2 of bonding a trio (2 boys 1 girl) to a quad (2 boys 2 girls)

there were a couple scuffles on the morning of day 1, but settled for the rest of the day, i have seen postive grooming a couple times (they have all licked eachother at least once) they share food with no fights, and plenty of flops! however i am now in the afternoon of day 2 and the girls have started fighting frequently (couple scuffles every couple hours) their fights end very quickly, and sometimes i don’t even need to intervene- but i’ve just spotted a wound on the younger girls ear - it’s stopped bleeding on its own and doesn’t appear deep but i don’t know if this means i should separate them?

should i give it a few more hours/ the rest of the day to see if the fighting subsides or is this injury a sign i should separate ASAP?

wound doesn’t seem sore, bun let me wash it out with no visible discomfort so it’s definitely only surface level, but deep enough to bleed
 
I would make sure that there are plenty of places to escape to, rather than separate them now. eg tunnels, boxes, piles of hay, scattered food for distraction. It sounds pretty good going for day 2 of a huge bond. If you separate now, you risk the bond breaking down completely - so I would keep a close eye on them and only separate if it looks like a serious (locked-on) fight rather than a scuffle where fur is pulled.

I'm assuming this is a trio bond to which you are adding one, rather than a 3 & 4 bond to a group of 7......
 
Shimmer said:
I would make sure that there are plenty of places to escape to, rather than separate them now. eg tunnels, boxes, piles of hay, scattered food for distraction. It sounds pretty good going for day 2 of a huge bond. If you separate now, you risk the bond breaking down completely - so I would keep a close eye on them and only separate if it looks like a serious (locked-on) fight rather than a scuffle where fur is pulled.

I'm assuming this is a trio bond to which you are adding one, rather than a 3 & 4 bond to a group of 7......
Click to expand...
I took it as bonding 7 - which really frightened me - but perhaps I misunderstood.
 
bunny momma said:
How are they doing today?
Click to expand...
i separated them into side by side pens (the girl in one, my trio in another) at about 2am this morning after duffy (the new girl) caused 4 more fights with a lot of attempts at latch on biting, the
original girl was getting incredibly stressed out and i wholeheartedly didn’t want to risk leaving them together just incase i fell asleep and didn’t wake up in time to stop the damage being done

not too sure what to do today, should i have a go at putting the girl back in and hope the night of being side by side has helped? i did check on them several times through the night and i saw both girls flopped side by side (with the pen panel) between them quite a few times !
 
Maybe leave the divider in place for a few days?
Or try her with just one of the trio boys today to see how that goes?
How long have you had the newbie? Has she had time to settle in?
She sounds like she's getting quite defensive as a single against 3 rabbits at once. She needs to be more comfortable with it all. It may take longer than anticipated to bond them. You could also end up with 2 pairs and try a quad bond later.
 
i started bonding the day after i brought the new one home - i wanted to wait for her to settle first but i’ve adopted her from a rescue and the rescue wanted me to try to bond straight away so they know if i need to give her back or not.....

i’ve put them all together again this morning, in a slightly bigger pen, thinking maybe if the two girls aren’t as close to each other they may not fight? but if any bad fights do happen today i think i will permanently separate them them all and either try a 2 pair bonds or retry the quad bond a few months down the line, and just tell the rescue that is my plan.

the new girl is 5 years old and been in the rescue for 2 years i really don’t want to have to give her back as she so sweet (usually) and deserves her forever home already :,)

so far they have been together again for just over an hour - no fights and the girls did briefly share some hay together - so fingers crossed they got all their fights out last night 🤞 but atleast i have a back up plan of separating side by side for a while if things do go bad again today

i have kept half the divider in the pen so one of the girls does have a place to ‘hide’ away from the other also, but while still in the same place
 
It's not the best time of year for bonding - Spring fever affects many rabbits and their behaviour changes for a while, even if they have been neutered for years. I've always found girls harder to bond anyway as they get feisty. The new girl will be going through a lot of changes right now - new home, new routine, new companions to deal with if she's been on her own for a while. Her whole world just changed overnight. Giving them more time can only be a good thing. I hope it works out eventually - it will be worth the wait.
 
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