advice on bonding plan for bisc please

bisc has started to seem lonely now. it will be six weeks tomorrow since we lost matt.

anyway, i really need help getting a bonding plan together.

we think it would be best if bisc chose his own friend so we will be taking him to a local rescue to choose. (don't know which one yet) - does it matter what age the new bunny is? bisc is coming upto 7.5years old. i want to insure the new bunny so i think they would have to be upto 5years old. i assume breed and size doesn't matter to them? basically we want it to be bisc's choice because he can be a snob and he would have to love them to be with them. we don't think he would want one he just tolerates if that makes sense.

we don't want to leave him anywhere to be bonded because i know he would hate that. so i have to continue the bond at home.

once bisc has found the friend he wants, do i bring them home in the same carrier?

the only neutral place we have is our bedroom but it isn't massive. i'll use c+c grids to make a neutral area but what size should it be and what should be inside it? how long do i initially do this for? and once i feel like they are ok, do i then increase the space again and see how they go? at what point can i bring them to the lounge which will be where they will be permanently?

how do i know if the bond is going well? what behaviour should i expect to see?

do i need to buy any new things like litter trays, blanket, bowl etc or can i just try and neutralise them? how do i neutralise the lounge carpet? would vinegar be ok to neutralise everything?

the other issue will be feeding because bisc is very sensitive and only eats certain foods. how would i go about feeding them together when they eat differently?

sorry for all the questions but i need to get prepared. anything else you can think of to mention, please do.

i am nervous about this and if i am totally honest, i didn't want another rabbit and we hoped bisc would be ok alone and for the first month or so he seemed to be and i know he wouldn't have accepted another bunny in that time, but now we both can see he seems to be getting a bit lonely and it breaks my heart. i want what is best for bisc and i know i can love another bunny. i just would have preferred a break for a while if possible but not at the expense of bisc's happiness.

thanks x

I guess if he has been ok with the new rabbit at the rescue it would be ok to bring them home in the same carrier (only a guess though).

Neutral space vinegar and water or just neat vinegar. I neutralised all litter trays this way. I chose to put down a litter tray per rabbit plus a couple of extras so if they got posessive there was always plenty of choice.

I used a puppy panel pen 4 x 2 for a group of six which is now a quad (2 didnt want to join the bond - too stressful for them).

I wasnt sure what to expect behaviour wise although I had read up on 'fight' signals (tail up, ears back). They were all really curious - ears forward. It took a while (cant remember how long, it was like being in a different time zone) for any fights to occur. They were easy to break up (a piece of board gently between them and when I got more confident a gentle voice and a hand on one of them).

Ignoring is often a good sign as they get used to each other. Mine tended to spend a lot of time separate just staring before interacting (apart from the very first few mins when they were all mingling). Frosty was always the boss. He would approach the others (one by one) and spent a lot of time chasing Snowflake and nipping him. They are fine now though (exactly one and a day later).

Dont have any experience of the food thing but you could probably put a divider in to feed them although it may be a good thing to let them have food together sometimes too.

Its so great for Bisc that you are reading him and doing what suits him. Hope it all goes really well.

I have only ever done this one bond. It has been really fascinating but I am absolutely not in any way an expert and there are so many on here who are.

Very best of luck.

I've read that bringing them home in the same carrier can help with bonding, the stress of the car journey makes them huddle together and turn to each other for comfort, a good start. Other than that, a small neutral space. A bit of chasing, nipping and humping is normal but hopefully no fighting. Don't increase the space until the humping, nipping etc has stopped, and then do it gradually.
It can be stressful bonding, but sometimes it's as easy as pie! Here's hoping for pie!

thank you both. i want to start getting everything ready so i know exactly what i'm doing. i'll start by washing the c+c grids in vinegar i think and get them put to one side ready. need to measure the bedroom aswell and see if we can create some more space by moving some of the drawers around. :roll:

o/h is going away for a week at the end of october so aslong as bisc remains ok for now, then it will have to be done after. this gives us time to plan everything and get in touch with some rescues locally aswell.

if i have got this wrong and bisc doesn't want a friend, you will all hear him thumping from the rescue guaranteed! :lol: hopefully one lovely girl will be to his taste. i've never had a female bunny either so that will be new. :shock:

i'll post with anymore questions and nervous rantings over the next couple of weeks. :lol:

Six weeks already

I am so attached to Ash, that whilst there were a million reasons why I didn't match her up before, the first being her health issues, but one of them was definitely that I was worried the second bunny wouldn't be as loved. Bailey has fitted in really well though and we adore him. We hadn't lost a bunny though so I guess it's different.

I don't think size and age really matter to the bunny, it's more to do with your personal preference. If you don't want any more rabbits after them then don't choose a young bunny.

Ours were bonded at the rescue so different, but once we brought them home we kept them in a 5ft x 2ft space for awhile (indoor cage) before gradually increasing the space and now they run loose.

Some mounting, chasing and fur pulling is normal as long as the mountee doesn't get cross and they resolve it themselves. Bailey used to hump Ash a lot when we first got him home a couple of weeks ago but it's gradually decreased.

You probably know this already but truly aggressive behaviour is (I think) boxing, rolling around together and biting genitals etc and a lot of rescues will say there's no chance of the bond being successful if it gets to this stage but I think some people on here have had better experiences.

Bringing home in the same carrier i think is ok, in fact car journeys can be useful for bonding buns.

We have to feed Ash and Bailey separately because Ash has to eat more pellets due to her issues and Bailey is like a hoover and will happily steal all the food out if he gets the chance. It's tricky getting the balance right, I can't leave food out for her all day like I used to. But I'm hoping to get some puppy panels etc that way I can separate them briefly whilst feeding but so they can still see each other. OH and I are out a lot of the day mostly so it seems like all my time in the mornings/evenings is trying to make sure Ash eats enough so it should help me have some more free time too. :thumb:

By the way, single buns at rescues tend to go quicker cos they are either bonded with other single buns there or they get snapped up by people like us. Bailey was never even advertised on the rescue's website, I just happened to email the manager the day he was cleared for rehoming (we had already been approved). So bear that in mind...

good luck :wave:

thank you ashbunny.

i know, six weeks tomorrow. wish he could just come back

i have measured the bedroom space now and it is 7ft x 5ft but i can add an extra foot to that if i move some drawers around. that should be ok for the initial stages i think?

when am i meant to sleep, use the bathroom and shower! :shock:

I'm afraid I'm no expert, only having done one bond, which was 2 pairs (mm) & (ff) into a quad :shock: I did this so that they could go from having hutch/run setups to a shed and really big run.

Anyway, I think as has been said, chasing, fur pulling and mounting is to be expected, but from my limited experience that was to sort out who was going to be top bunny. It was only the top bun from both pairs that was the chaser and chased, and there was no aggression in it, a bit of fur pulling but nothing much, the other 2 ignored everything. then top bun Dandy (m) mounted the 2 girls once, but that was it. I noticed that chasing reoccurred when I moved them back outside, but it was only for a few minutes. I think it's usual for chasing etc to reoccur when they are moved to new territories, so don't be alarmed if things seem to go backwards for example when they first come home, I think it's a case of re asserting who is top bun with a new territory. The chasing was in my case easily diverted by putting forage in, hay, dandelions and rosemary were enough to stop mine. I think it's best to keep them in the same place throughout bonding and only increase space when there's been no chasing etc for at least 48hrs but I think the longer you can leave it the less chance there is of unsettling them.

I didn't use any litter trays at all until they'd been together a week, so that they wouldn't claim territories, I just put hay and newspaper all over in the pen, my bonding pen was an xxl dog crate, but puppy pens would be easier to intervene if necessary. I didn't intervene at all with mine apart from keep on putting in forage for diversion tactics, although obviously if there was fighting I would have called the bonding off.

My essential bonding kit included gardening gloves in case I had to separate fighting buns, which I didn't need, and wine for stress relieving purposes :lol: I definitely had a nice easy bond, and I hope you do too. I think what helped me prepare for what to expect was reading all the bonding threads, everyone does things differently but you can get a lot of tips from them. My bonding thread is here http://forums.rabbitrehome.org.uk/showthread.php?402162-U-d-day-10-Bonding-a-quad
I slept on the settee with dog crate in the lounge, toilet was just next door so everything to hand, but in the earliest stages I got my OH or one of the kids to watch them if I needed the loo. I would suggest trying to sleep in the same room, or if you are in the next room unless you are a heavy sleeper I'm sure you would hear if things kicked off. Hopefully an experienced border will respond to your thread to give you some advice, I know each bond will be different. Post or PM away if you need any more help, you should never need to feel alone with RU to help

thank you zoobec it's so good to have support on here. i feel nervous about it but i will fake calm when i'm doing the bond. :lol: make sure they know that i am the boss (when bisc allows :lol

i am sooooo scared about getting to know a new bun though. they have so many of their own quirky things and ways they deal with illness and it scares me to death! :shock: i am excited though that i can offer a home to a rescue bunny. my first rabbit rescue.

i'm trying to get all the spare grids together that we have randomly around the house and in the shed aswell. :roll: i'll get them washed and put to one side ready.