Do you want to bond a trio? Read this first

[Gayeray]

Hello Everyone
Can you offer some advice please. We have Jessie (male neutered 20 months) and Boo (femaile spayed 8 months) who were bonded for 4 months, this bonding went very well indeed. Although inseperable we felt that Jessie was a bit smothered and pestered by Boo and we fell in love with Buster a 4 month male. We brought Buster home and kept him seperate but let him run around in the kitchen while the other two were out of the room. When the pair next came in the kitchen they started behaving differently towards eachother, by the evening they were chasing and fur pulling quite viciously, so much so we had to separate them. We did not expect just the smell of the new rabbit would break their bond. Two futrther meetings of Jessie and Boo have been no better they seem well an truely to have fallen out. I will be taking Buster to be neutered as soon as possible (next week or two latest as he has already sprayed - something not experienced by us before) and once he is healed I would like to start to try and bond the trio or at least a pair. Please can you offer any advice for doing this as we were origionaly quite sure of how to proceed but this was very unexpected. We do have the offer of a loving home (wihin the family) for one rabbit if we only manage a pair as although we are managing the 3 separated rabbits it is not the best quality of life for any of them. These are all house rabbits.

Thank you for any advice you can give.

Regards
Gaye

[Sky-O]

Hi Gaye,

Welcome to the site.

It's very expected that referred aggression will occur when there is a new bunny around, or when bunnies are in sight, hearing or smell distance of each other.

It's best to keep your boy totally separate until 6-8 weeks after he has been neutered, and then try to bond. Don't do anything too quick.

What methods did you use to try and rebond?

[jane anne]

I have 3 rabbits, Daisy who is about 2 years old (male....yeah we were told he was female and by the time it was obvious he was not it was too late to change his name lol). Then there is Baby, also male around 18mths old and lastly poppy a 5 month old female.

All the rabbits have their own hutch but as the garden is secure they are allowed to run around during daylight hours every day, at the moment I also have two 'runs' and I rotate them every few hours so each one gets better exercise.

The female has been neutered but the males have not.

What I want to know is if I have the males neutered will they all be able to play out together or is it unlikely they will get on?

We have tried the boys in the garden together but Daisy just humps Baby and Baby ends up biting though they have never had a full on fight, Daisy has ended up with some nasty nips.

All the rabbits know each other but only through the mesh of the runs

Any advice would be gratefully accepted

[janice]

What I want to know is if I have the males neutered will they all be able to play out together or is it unlikely they will get on? If you get the two males neutered and leave it about 6 weeks to allow their hormones to decline, you would need to allow them to be bonded on totally neutral territory. Rabbits that are not bonded and are allowed out to play will injure each other as the territory will be not neutral. If you are planning to put them together you need to ensure that you prepare everything in advance and have suitable accomodation for them all to live together and adequate tme to bond them.

We have tried the boys in the garden together but Daisy just humps Baby and Baby ends up biting though they have never had a full on fight, Daisy has ended up with some nasty nips. If you have 2 unneutered rabbits please do not allow them together unless they have properly been bonded on neutral territory. If they are allowed out to play together without bonding them properly it is highly likely that you will end up with some nasty injuries to your rabbits, it is also possible for 2 unneutered males to try ad castrate each other, if they do try this you will have some horrid injuries which will be expensive to threat and will cause a lot of pain and suffering to your rabbits.

All the rabbits know each other but only through the mesh of the runs Rabbits responses through the wires can be very different when places on territory that one of them seems to be their own. Please do remember in the wild that rabbits will often fight until the death to defend their own territory.

[jane anne]

Thanx for the reply, So basically I should still continue to let them out on their own and it really wouldn't make a difference if I had the boys 'done'?

How about an intact male with the neutered female? will that work or will they end up fighting because he wants what she doesn't?

I just thought how much easier it would be to just let them all have the run of the garden all day rather than having to swap them around taking it in turns but if you think it wont work I will leave as is and not have the boys go through the surgery (I didn't want to house them together just run together).......I thought rabbits did live together happily!

[Babsie]

[Thanx for the reply, So basically I should still continue to let them out on their own and it really wouldn't make a difference if I had the boys 'done'?[/B]How about an intact male with the neutered female? will that work or will they end up fighting because he wants what she doesn't?

I just thought how much easier it would be to just let them all have the run of the garden all day rather than having to swap them around taking it in turns but if you think it wont work I will leave as is and not have the boys go through the surgery (I didn't want to house them together just run together).......I thought rabbits did live together happily!

I don't think that is quite what was being said - but they would need to be neutered and then bonded on neutral territory.

It would be advisable to have them neutered anyway.

[jane anne]

My problem is the 'bonding' I get the impression to bond them they have to actually 'live' in the same hutch, I have 3 hutches and they are not big enough to house 3 rabbits so I don't want them sleeping together. All 3 use the garden and 'mark' it by rubbing their faces on walls and fences etc so even the garden isn't a neutral area so I'm a bit stuck. I just wanted to be able to open their hutches in a morning and let them eat grass together then let them go back in their own hutch at night.

If just being out together isn't an option I don't see how the boys would benefit by being subjected to surgery. I only had the female done as in the past I have had females who turn quite nasty when they are left in tact. The boys however are friendly and not aggressive with humans so if I am not going to mix them then I won't risk anesthetic unnecessarily. That seems cruel.

[Elena]

Without neutering any bond will be much harder, the boys will be only interested in reproducing and won't be able to interact properly. Eventually the female is likely to get fed up with it and turn and a fight may ensue. Also two unneutered boys will often fight to the death if they mix, even accidentally.

They also are a lot tidier once neutered and wont continually mark and spray urine. There are also medical benefits. With a rabbit savvy vet who performs the op regularly the risk is greatly reduced.

[jane anne]

Thanx for all your advice.

[Snowytoshi]

This thread has so much good info in it! I only have one query- I noticed a lot of stuff about f x f x m, but nothing about m x m x f. Does that work or will the two boys fight?