Hi all, I am new to this forum and hope this is the right place for this topic. I have always had dogs and parrots, but never a bunny. I started fostering a 4 week old feral bunny who was rejected by his (or her, since sex is still undetermined) mom. We named him Houdini. I hand fed him bunny milk replacement for 2 more weeks before completely switching him to hay and fresh veggies. This was about 3 months ago. I have since decided to adopt him. He is now about 4 months old. He used to binky and zoom once in awhile when I stood there watching him and would come to sniff my hand and look for pets.
My husband, who loves bunnies, was trying to get him used to getting picked up since Houdini absolutely hates it and he would just grab him (not aggressively) and then he would walk around with the bun for a few minutes. He did this for about a week and now Houdini seems to be less friendly with us. He has stopped binkying when he sees me and would just freeze. I can still pet him on his forehead, but he seems more skittish and it’s like he’s always prepared to flee at a moment’s notice if necessary. I have told my husband to stop doing picking him up since I feel he is stressing the bun out rather than desensitizing him by forcing him to be picked up. He has since stopped picking him up. But I feel the damage has been done.
Will Houdini ever trust us again? How can we get him to trust us and eventually get him accustomed to being picked up? What can we do to help with bonding? Thank you so much for reading.
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My husband, who loves bunnies, was trying to get him used to getting picked up since Houdini absolutely hates it and he would just grab him (not aggressively) and then he would walk around with the bun for a few minutes. He did this for about a week and now Houdini seems to be less friendly with us. He has stopped binkying when he sees me and would just freeze. I can still pet him on his forehead, but he seems more skittish and it’s like he’s always prepared to flee at a moment’s notice if necessary. I have told my husband to stop doing picking him up since I feel he is stressing the bun out rather than desensitizing him by forcing him to be picked up. He has since stopped picking him up. But I feel the damage has been done.
Will Houdini ever trust us again? How can we get him to trust us and eventually get him accustomed to being picked up? What can we do to help with bonding? Thank you so much for reading.
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Are you in America or another country? Is the rabbit wild or a loose pet? In the UK wild rabbits are very prone to stress/shock so extremely difficult to hand rear, so well done! Even domestic rabbits don't like to be handled, as mentioned it's best to let the rabbit come up to you on his/her own terms. You can use a pet carrier to move the rabbit around instead of picking them up once they get used to going in/out of it and a lot of health checks can be done with the rabbit on the floor which avoids the need for too much handling 
