Four bonded house bunnies a good idea?

[tigerlilyb84]

Hi all,

I'm relatively new to being a bunny owner, having begun with my beautiful Dexter who I found abandoned at the side of the road in February.

Since then, I have learnt what amazing pets rabbits can be. Dexter is a house bunny and lives in our large living room/dining room. We adopted Pippa as a companion for Dexter in May and they formed an amazing bond but sadly she died 6 weeks later of a lung tumour.

Dexter seems fine in himself but we'd like him to have a new companion as I feel he'd be even happier that way. We recentl went to a rescue centre and adopted a beautiful, gentle bun called Freddie. Then my friend asked me if we could take on her female Daisey as she can't give her the love or attention she needs anymore.

So, currently the plan is to begin bonding them as a trio next week (they are all currently single), but being a huge softy I saw a poor bun being advertised on facebook that I would also love to rehome as he's never fed hay or been to the vet and know I could give him a better home.

My issues/concerns
- are 4 rabbits too much to have in the house?
- can I afford the vet bills of bunny number 4
- am I insane? Lol

We have a large garden and a huge outdoor pen that we currently put Dexter out in whenever the weather is nice so they wouldn't have to be inside all of the time.

I think I'm a bit nervous about even having a trio, but I can't stop thinking about Thumper (bunny 4) and will feel guilty if I don't adopt him.

Obviously the other option is to have two indoors, two outdoors, but I would be concerned that the outdoor buns wouldn't get as much time or attention because obviously it's easier to spend time with your house buns, especially when they're jumping all over you when you're watching tv!

Any thoughts/advice would be very welcome! Xx

 

[Toffee_kate]

Hello, is Freddie a boy? Generally, even when neutered 2 male rabbits will never bond and they will be very aggressive towards each other (I know there are a few exceptions to this rule) This may not be great news for a girl bunny either. Males and females yes and two girls together usually only works if they are litter mates. Hope this helps.

 

[RogerRabbit999]

I've got 2 males bonded and to be honest they are much nicer to each other and never seem to have a single cross word as oppose to my male/female bonded pair. I think it all depends very much on the temperament of individual bunnies. Neither Buster or Paddington have got a single mean bone in their bodies, and totally worship each other. Pippa is positively vile at times to Dipsy (most of the time). In 'rabbits in need' you often see 2 males, and from my own personal experiences this would be my preferred combination. Often when you see bondings having broken down, you will notice it is usually a male/female combination. At the end of the day, no combination is guaranteed to succeed, and every bonded pair has the potential to break their bond for whatever reason. I have 5 house bunnies by the way.

Why don't you insure Freddie? Then you won't have to worry about any vets bills.

 

[Snowytoshi]

Respectfully disagreeing Toffee_kate, same sex pairs can get along perfectly fine together. Just as with male x female it depends on their personality and how much time you can put into them. My first pair was male x male and after two bonding sessions they never left each other's side. When Snowy passed, I bonded Toshi to Paige and that took six months and several nasty scars on my leg. Toshi and my other male, Joshua don't really care about each other when they're in a neutral space. I know someone who has three males bonded to two females, the list goes on. The lady who has five bonded bunnies wrote these two articles about bunny bonding and the second link actually talks about same sex bonding: http://www.wheekwheekthump.com/2013/06/17/4-rabbit-bonding-beliefs-that-arent-always-true/
http://www.wheekwheekthump.com/2013/06/20/3-more-surprising-rabbit-bonding-myths/

My issues/concerns
- are 4 rabbits too much to have in the house?
- can I afford the vet bills of bunny number 4
- am I insane? Lol

In my opinion four rabbits are not to many, just so long as you have the space for each of them if the bonding does not work. I have three rabbits at the moment, two of which are bonded and one who is single. The bonded pair live downstairs and the single rabbit lives in my room because of the way the house is setup, I have no room for another single rabbit. Another thing to consider is if you have four single rabbits, will all of them get ample time out of their cage?

The other two questions are really based on your income and a trained psychologist.

Also if you're worried about bonding, 1) larger groups are often easier, though not always 2) your local rescue center could probably help with bonding.

 

[tigerlilyb84]

I have 5 house bunnies by the way.

Why don't you insure Freddie? Then you won't have to worry about any vets bills.

Roger - where do you keep all of your house bunnies? Are they in different rooms? Ours are in our living room hence the reservations about having as many as 4

I think we'll insure if we end up with 3 or 4 buns. At the moment we put money away every month but with 4 it's not worth the risk to not have them insured

 

[tigerlilyb84]

Snowytoshi,

Being optimistic, I'm hoping my two options will either be a quad or two bonded pairs so in terms of having time out, we'd have two indoors with ample time out of the indoor hutch and the other two would have to be outdoors with the intention of having a large hutch with permanent access to a run.

My boyfriend isn't mad keen on having 4 as they can be quite messy and with them being in our living room it could be a bit much!

He's happy with trying 3, but I really cannot stop thinking about
the fourth bun!

I'll book an appointment with the psychologist next week

 

[Jojo123]

If your having three one more wont make much of a difference I have two boys they get on great, I put them together before my second bunny was neutered and they started to fight so had to split them up and was worried they wouldn't bond again but they were fine and are best of friends now! They are house bunnies and do make a mess at the moment but think its down to territory issues they both have a poops around their litter boxes, according to what I have read it may be down to having too much room :wave:

 

[MrCutey]

..

 

[RogerRabbit999]

Roger - where do you keep all of your house bunnies? Are they in different rooms? Ours are in our living room hence the reservations about having as many as 4

I think we'll insure if we end up with 3 or 4 buns. At the moment we put money away every month but with 4 it's not worth the risk to not have them insured

Dipsy and Pippa are bonded and have a puppy pen in the lounge, but free-range all day. Bodger is in another puppy pen in the lounge and loves bunny neighbours, but is basically a very traumatised bunny, and he free-ranges all night because he doesn't tolerate noise etc well, and can only be out when the other bunnies are away.

Buster and Paddington, my bonded boys have a really big spare double bedroom, and free-range upstairs all day. Because Buster is a French Lop, and a really big bunny they are loose in their room, because no hutch or indoor cage in my opinion is big enough for a Frenchie.

 

[esupi]

We have two house bunnies and two outdoor bunnies. The outdoor bunnies are probably getting more attention than the indoor ones currently, but I will feel sorry for them come winter as it'll just be too dark for me to keep an eye on them free-ranging except at weekends.

I wouldn't imagine 4 indoors would be too much trouble, although hadn't considered it myself. Our indoor setup is just perfectly sized for our little dinky pair, so it wouldn't really fit any more, but if you built it around a quad from the start I would imagine it'd be fine.

 

[Dollys Buns]

I have 4 buns in my flat - it is a large flat though and they free range through out it. It was a struggle at first getting used to them (had never had an animal before never mind 4 rabbits) but now I wouldn't change it. They did come 'pre-bonded' though so I guess I had it very easy in that aspect. But it can work as long as you don't mind poops and hay everywhere (they do have and use their litter trays but the odd poops do seem to drop out- usually just after I've finished cleaning).

Good luck - I do hope you get the Face book bunny...:thumb:

 

[Hesperus]

3 bunnies, 4 bunnies... yes I think considering the bills is the main thing. But I think that aside, if you can afford bunny no. 4 then everything else can be sorted out. (Cleaning up mess I find isn't much different once you've got 2 animals 3 animals etc).

Perhaps get some insurance quotes and sit and work it out!

Good luck!