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Trying to bond neutered male rabbits

andyjudy

Young Bun
Hello I'm new to this forum and rabbits. My daughter bought two baby male rabbits at the beginning of the year from pets at home. Denzel, the bigger of the two has always been relaxed and loved having the run of the house. Oreo has always been very shy and wouldn't come out if people were round. Due to work commitments we moved them to our house in July. They live in our dining room in a large puppy pen that we bought for them. We made them a large outdoor run and they could come and go from the run back into their pen in the dining room. Three weeks into the move here there was a massive fight with Oreo trying to constantly mount Denzel. This ended with blood and fur everywhere. We split the pen into 2 and kept them side by side. We had them both neutered in august and they have lived in pens side by side since with separate times in the run. I've gradually moved the pens next go each other. Today after Oreo finally chilled out and relaxed while I stroked his head, I've finally seen Oreo grooming Denzel's head through the cage. I think he thought it was Denzel grooming his head when I was stroking him.
The question I have is go you think I will ever be able to put these two together again after the ferocious fight they had in the past.
This is Denzel and Oreo before there fight

Judy
https://vimeo.com/184562641


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If rabbits have a fight there is always the danger that they won't ever be bonded. Also, they really can fight to the death. When were they castrated?
 
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welcome to RU. Its possible your bunnies could be bonded. As Babsie said rabbits can fight to the death & rabbits do seem to remember past traumas. Now they have been neutered & left a while they stand a better chance as you'll be aware. If you were to try this yourself I'd arm yourself with as much info as possible about how to bond (this in itself can be confusing as there are many different bonding styles), see bonding threads on here, watch videos on you tube, ask questions here. Their nasty fight is a worry though, it would be imperative you were close enough & had the right 'tools' to intervene. Even better might be to see if anybody offers a bonding service in your area
 
Oh no, I'm sorry the boys have fallen out. :(

Just to give you a bit of hope, before I adopted my two boys from rescue they had apparently had a pretty nasty fight while with their previous owners. It resulted in one of them having permanently damaged ears. This had happened before one of them had been castrated. Thanks to the rescue they were re-bonded and lived happily as a pair until one sadly passed away earlier this year.

I hope you are able to re-bond them again. J & B has given some really good advice about going about it although if you're able to get hands on help from someone who has lots of experience in bonding then that should make it a lot easier for you.

Good luck :wave:
 
Thank you for your replies, I had given up hope of them getting back together as Oreo would still jump at denzel as he went past his cage to the run. I've watched loads of videos and read quite a bit about bonding. I will have a look at the threads on here joey&boo. I swapped them round into each other's cage today, I think I'm gonna carry on with that for a while before I attempt to bond them again. Most of the bonding videos I've seen have been in small spaces but I've read that's it's better if they are in a larger space.
You have given me hope scrappy little helper, it's a relief to hear that someone else has had success after a nasty fight. I know denzel castration had to be postponed due to the gash Oreo had given him on his testicles. Sorry your rabbit passed away, how is the other one getting on now?


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Thank you for your replies, I had given up hope of them getting back together as Oreo would still jump at denzel as he went past his cage to the run. I've watched loads of videos and read quite a bit about bonding. I will have a look at the threads on here joey&boo. I swapped them round into each other's cage today, I think I'm gonna carry on with that for a while before I attempt to bond them again. Most of the bonding videos I've seen have been in small spaces but I've read that's it's better if they are in a larger space.
You have given me hope scrappy little helper, it's a relief to hear that someone else has had success after a nasty fight. I know denzel castration had to be postponed due to the gash Oreo had given him on his testicles. Sorry your rabbit passed away, how is the other one getting on now?


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yeah pretty much everyone recommends bonding in a neutral space, opinion is more divided on amount of space- I user a bigger space which was the only way I could manage to bond my current trio as it gave my submissive doe an opportunity to escape the feisty one! This probably only worked as the submissive one never made any attempt to fight back & could outrun the bossy one. I hope it works out, let us know how it goes
 
Thank you for your replies, I had given up hope of them getting back together as Oreo would still jump at denzel as he went past his cage to the run. I've watched loads of videos and read quite a bit about bonding. I will have a look at the threads on here joey&boo. I swapped them round into each other's cage today, I think I'm gonna carry on with that for a while before I attempt to bond them again. Most of the bonding videos I've seen have been in small spaces but I've read that's it's better if they are in a larger space.
You have given me hope scrappy little helper, it's a relief to hear that someone else has had success after a nasty fight. I know denzel castration had to be postponed due to the gash Oreo had given him on his testicles. Sorry your rabbit passed away, how is the other one getting on now?


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Thank you. The other rabbit is doing well, he is now happily bonded with a female rabbit :)

To be honest when I bonded them I found getting the size of the space right quite tricky. You want it to be small enough that they have to interact and work out their hierarchy. But at first my male bun Snoopy was agitated at being stuck in a smaller area as he's used to being a free range house bun and going where he pleases. I found when I extended it a bit he relaxed a lot more and the bond went a lot more smoothly. I guess it's a case of trial and error and seeing what works best for the boys.
 
Thank you. The other rabbit is doing well, he is now happily bonded with a female rabbit :)

To be honest when I bonded them I found getting the size of the space right quite tricky. You want it to be small enough that they have to interact and work out their hierarchy. But at first my male bun Snoopy was agitated at being stuck in a smaller area as he's used to being a free range house bun and going where he pleases. I found when I extended it a bit he relaxed a lot more and the bond went a lot more smoothly. I guess it's a case of trial and error and seeing what works best for the boys.

That's good that he has a female now, I wondered what happened to bonded rabbits when there partners passed away as I thought they bonded for life but it's good to know they will bond with another rabbit.
I think I need to do a lot more reading befor I attempt to bond them, I don't want to make things worse.


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Just been catching up on this thread.
I kept looking at it on my phone but I couldn't see the video or anything.

I read tons on bonding when I was bonding my two females (they had a fight during bonding, but we still got a successful bond). We ended up doing the bonding completely different to everything we read online and the bonding took a total of three months.

From what I saw in your bunny cam video it wasn't too bad of an interaction really. Yes there was chasing, but chasing is a normal part of bonding and it didn't look to bad as you were able to put your hand out to stop them. They also then interacted through the bars which looked very calm & comfortable so I have high hopes for your future bonding with these two.

You can read as much as you like, get as many different techniques as you can find so if you need to change plans, you've got a few back ups to chose from. We started our girls with the slow technique (dates, living next door, swapping cages) but they ultimately got confused after a certain point and began fighting so we then moved onto having them do a weekend bond, but they didn't get past the first 10 mins before one had a severe bite to her shoulder. We separated right away and gave them a week living apart.
In the end they were stress bonded as a last ditch at getting them to bond (our last resort before we gave up on bonding) - we took them for a short car drive then put them in a dog crate in the bedroom. I went a week without sleep as I had to stay up day/night to keep an eye on them. I also slept downstairs once they moved into their shared accommodation.

All bonding was done in a space of about 28sqft (apart from the dog crate which was around 12sqft) which worked well for us. Many people are 100% against stress bonding, which I can understand, but I felt it was suitable to try before giving up on the bond.

Lots of good luck and don't be afraid to ask questions.
 
Just been catching up on this thread.
I kept looking at it on my phone but I couldn't see the video or anything.

I read tons on bonding when I was bonding my two females (they had a fight during bonding, but we still got a successful bond). We ended up doing the bonding completely different to everything we read online and the bonding took a total of three months.

From what I saw in your bunny cam video it wasn't too bad of an interaction really. Yes there was chasing, but chasing is a normal part of bonding and it didn't look to bad as you were able to put your hand out to stop them. They also then interacted through the bars which looked very calm & comfortable so I have high hopes for your future bonding with these two.

You can read as much as you like, get as many different techniques as you can find so if you need to change plans, you've got a few back ups to chose from. We started our girls with the slow technique (dates, living next door, swapping cages) but they ultimately got confused after a certain point and began fighting so we then moved onto having them do a weekend bond, but they didn't get past the first 10 mins before one had a severe bite to her shoulder. We separated right away and gave them a week living apart.
In the end they were stress bonded as a last ditch at getting them to bond (our last resort before we gave up on bonding) - we took them for a short car drive then put them in a dog crate in the bedroom. I went a week without sleep as I had to stay up day/night to keep an eye on them. I also slept downstairs once they moved into their shared accommodation.

All bonding was done in a space of about 28sqft (apart from the dog crate which was around 12sqft) which worked well for us. Many people are 100% against stress bonding, which I can understand, but I felt it was suitable to try before giving up on the bond.

Lots of good luck and don't be afraid to ask questions.

Thank you for giving me hope. The first videos I saw were on stress bonding, it sounds like it worked for you even though they had previously had a big fight. I'm happy with how my boys are doing at the moment. They are now right next to each other in their pens, this morning when I went into them there was a tuft of fur in oreos pen but it was only a small tuft.
The video was just a little taster of what they were like. The last time they were together Oreo had his head bowed down face to face with Denzel, I think he wanted Denzel to groom him but Denzel wouldn't, them all hell broke out with a chase and fur flying.
I just want to make sure I get it right, I don't want them to come to hate each other so I'm going real slow with them.
I put there food on either side of the pen so they are sat eating together with the pen in between and they look very relaxed.
Just wondering will I be doing more harm letting them out of each other's sight when they have separate use of the outside run


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Fur pulling and chasing is fine
Not a concern unless there is real injury.
The bowing a head down is demanding grooming and the following chasing/fur pulling will be them sorting out who is going to be the sub (doing the grooming) and who's the dominant (receiving grooming).
If you're going for the slow technique which is seems you are, they should ideally always be in view of each other and everything should be equal (same amount of space, play time etc) so if you can another run, I'd have them out together at the same time. (You can always connect the two runs together if they bond well).

When you come to doing your dates, make sure it's somewhere they have never been before. (E.g. bathroom if they've never visited there before)

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Fur pulling and chasing is fine
Not a concern unless there is real injury.
The bowing a head down is demanding grooming and the following chasing/fur pulling will be them sorting out who is going to be the sub (doing the grooming) and who's the dominant (receiving grooming).
If you're going for the slow technique which is seems you are, they should ideally always be in view of each other and everything should be equal (same amount of space, play time etc) so if you can another run, I'd have them out together at the same time. (You can always connect the two runs together if they bond well).

When you come to doing your dates, make sure it's somewhere they have never been before. (E.g. bathroom if they've never visited there before)

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Ok, thank you, I will have a think about how I can sort the run, it's tricky as Denzel jumps over it but I will put my thinking cap on. Also I like to just open the door and let them walk out into the run, I don't want to have to pick them up as it just stresses them. I have a wooden hutch in the outside run which I sometimes lock one of the rabbits in when the other is in the run but there are times when the rabbit in the run can't be seem by the other rabbit.
Lots for me to think about. They're very complex animals aren't they?


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Could you build a roof to go onto the top of the run to prevent jumping out?
Maybe use tunnels to each separate run?

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Could you build a roof to go onto the top of the run to prevent jumping out?
Maybe use tunnels to each separate run?

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Not really, this is the run, it goes right down the side to the front gate, the rabbits live in the room with the patio door so they can come straight out. Denzel jumps out of the pen in the house but he never tries in the garden. I think if I split the pen though and he was in one and Oreo in the other he would jump over to get to him.

5221076f09e2c3e34a7f746cd42acb09.jpg



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Thank you. Can I just ask for some advice, I've read on here that they suggest waiting till 12 weeks are up following neutering before attempting to bond. Oreo and Denzel are 6 and 7 weeks past neutering but they are now starting to lay next to each other in there separate pens and I've seen Oreo grooming Denzel through the bars. Does this mean they are ready to start bonding or should I wait till the 12 weeks are up?


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Personally I'd start bonding as you're seeing that behaviour , but you need to feel 100% confident that you're ready, so if you need to wait a little longer, than do.

Just remember, completely neutral space to do the bonding x

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Ok thank you, it's very nerve racking this bonding business. I plan to set up a pen in the bedroom for them, they've never but up there. But I will have to take them up in the same carrier. Not sure I'm 100% confident yet


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