How to introduce a new friend for a grieving bunny?

Hello,
our wonderful little Lilly passed away suddenly and entirely unexpectedly (cardiac arrest caused by a severe thunderstorm) in the early hours of Sunday morning, leaving behind Dottie (the little Lionhead), her friend since before we re-homed them at the age of 1 (which was a little under three years ago). Both really adored each other.
We allowed Dottie to sit next to Lilly's body for a few hours after she passed away and so far she is eating okay and appears to be as alright as possible given the circumstances.

outlines:
Lilly and Dottie live(d) in a purpose built, fully insulated 7 x 10 foot (2x3 meter) shed, with double glazed windows and electricity for winter heating. They have a 4 meter long rabbit runaround system pipe attached to the shed which gives them a secure 24/7 access to our VERY enclosed terraced garden (no foxes, no rats and also patrolled and marked by our 6 cats who all get on with the rabbits without any issues whatsoever).

We are beyond heartbroken and devastated and the last thing we want to do right now is find a new rabbit and go through the stress of bonding (which we've never done before) but from all we read it is best to do this as soon as possible?

so our questions are:

• how soon would you recommend we find her a new partner
• would she be better bonded with a male or female rabbit ( we've heard conflicting things from different people), given the space we've got could/should we try bonding her with a pair? (I've read the post about bonding three rabbits and am a bit anxious but if it did work it would give more rabbits a very good home and a richer social life)
• would you bond by putting a large cage within the existing shed and gradually letting them have contact or by taking both into the house (where would would divide a spare room with the mesh walls of a run). We'd like to spare Dottie the stress of ripping her out of her known environment and the freedom she's used to but if it was to take the territorial edge out of bonding than we'd obviously do so (though we are worried it might than flare up once the supposedly bonded pair moves back out into Dotties territory, only postponing the issue)

Any help would be greatly appreciated! THANKS!

So sorry you lost one of your bunnies. They look as if they had a very close bond. Were they sisters? Anyway, to try to help you with your questions.

Male/female bonds are usually the easiest pairs to bond, although if the original rabbit is the female she can be quite territorial and aggressive when introduced to a new rabbit.

Rabbits do tend to like a close relationship with one other rabbit so if you were to bring 2 rabbits home which were already bonded, she may feel left out.

I think you would have to try bonding her away from her territory as remaining in her territory would prevent her from accepting another bunny.

You would have to wait a considerable time if the bonding was successful before you put them back into her territory in order for the return not to upset the new bond. This could be a month say just to be really sure the bond was cemented. Then you could do it in small stages until they finally had the whole set up.

You could send her away to be bonded (I wouldn't do it personally) but some folk have and had success.

Thank you for your kind words and quick reply! We are devastated, never in a million years did we expect to lose one of them like this.
We will be looking into bonding her with a younger male, should we do this now or would you recommend we wait a few weeks ? We really don't want her to slip into boredom and loneliness but we also don't want to make her grief worse by taking away everything she knows when we move her into a new territory.
thanks

I am so sorry for your loss.

I also had to make this decision last year when we unexpectedly lost Benji.
I didn't want another bunny so soon, but I just imagined how scared and alone April must be, she was always the nervous rabbit and needed someone to lead her. We adopted Rupert two days after Benji passed away, because we didn't want April to be alone. We didn't really know how she was affected by Benji's death, but we wanted to act quickly just in case.
We opted for her to be bonded away from home, as the rescue was over an hour away, and a couple of days later her and Rupert were here. I know some people say that rabbits sometimes fight if they are bonded somewhere different and then brought home, but I've never once seen Rupert and April fight. It was best for us, but obviously, it's whatever is right for you. It could be that April is a particularly easy rabbit to bond, but there was no trouble rebonding her with Rupert after losing Benji.

I'm very sorry for your loss I know what you are going through as we recently lost our bun Chloe. I initially said I didn't want another one but after a few weeks it was clear Olly was getting depressed and was not finishing his food, so we took him to our local rescue to get bonded before he ended up ill.

They're both back home now and havent had any problems yet with being in Ollys territory, we exended their space gradually. But Chloe was also a rescue bun and we sent Olly away to get bonded there and we had no problems that time either.

Thanks for your feedback and the kind words!
We went and adopted a little 3 month old male rabbit from the pets at home adoption centre (his name is Harvey). They think he may have some dwarf mixed in (supposedly because his ears are very small) but assured us this wasn't going to be an issue when it came to bonding him with a regular sized bunny and that he would still grow for another 3 months (He#s 11-12 weeks old and weighs 1,1 kg , and since we had Dottie and Lilly as adults we have no idea how large he will end up being as we have no way of comparing him to any other rabbits of his age). They also said the fact that he wasn't neutered yet wouldn't matter (Dottie is spayed).

He had the sniffles and looked lonely (he's now been on antibiotics for a few days ) and we felt very bad for him so we were more easily convinced by them than we probably should have been simply because we wanted to get him out of there and I am now extremely worried that he may just be too young and generally too small to be bonded with our regular sized 3,5 year old Dottie (he's less than half her size right now). They also live in a "shed" with a free range of the (enclosed) garden and I am now worried he may stay too small to be able to ever do this (pictures of shed and rabbits attached)

It's another 4-5 weeks until he can be neutered, and Dottie is currently still in the shed, whilst Harvey is currently in a dog crate in the main living room (we have swapped litter between both). The introduction will take place in a spare sitting room, they will both get separate crates/pens and the rest of the room will be neutral meeting ground
Would you recommend we

1. take both of them inside into the neutral room now so they can live in separate pens in the same room and we start the final stage of introduction (the first physical encounter in the same space) after he's been neutered and they have lived side by side for a few weeks?
2. should we leave them in completely separate territories until he has been neutered and than proceed as above (separate pens in same room etc.)
3. or can we start introducing them now (once he's over the sniffles) and get him neutered in 4-6 weeks time after they are bonded (we usually send both bunnies to the vet if one needs to go, as we had minor issues with the previous bond after one of them was gone for a few days and our vet clinic is usually happy to take both)

I can see the pro's and con's of both but we are as worried about him still being too small & un-neutered as we are about Dottie having to be on her own for another 5-7 weeks..

We are introducing new foster cats every few months and it's something we are very comfortable and experienced with but as far as rabbits go we have no idea what to expect.

THANKS!!!

I did reply last night but it disappeared and it was my bed time, so I think it would be best to get little one better from his Snuffles (Pets at Home!) as it is supposed to be contagious. Then when he is better you could go either way you have described. Pets at Home shouldn't have said it would be ok to put him with her before he is neutered as he could well chase her with the intention of mating with her and she could get very annoyed. How old is he by the way?

I personally would leave them separate until he is over his op then pop them both in your spare room and hopefully they will like one another. IF she attacks him you will have to split them up quickly and rethink the situation.

As regards his size, it shouldn't make any difference to him being able to live in the shed and go in the garden.

thanks Tonibun! So glad to hear he could live in the shed, he is a climber and a runner and would definitely love the space/ garden.
Before they meet we are definitely getting him over his sniffles first!

He's got a final check up appt. on monday and she's got a tooth check up on the same day so i think we may do a first meeting in a cardboard box in the car on the way back from the vets and than put them in two separate dog crates in a neutral room for a brief initial hang out session, if it seems very obviously iffy we'll stop immediately and we'll try again in a few weeks after he's been neutered. If it seems okay-ish we may just let them live side by side for a bit and than start introducing them when he's been done. I'm hoping that as with our cat's reading your bunny and applying common sense will get us through...
We would ideally not do this at all yet but Dotty has started grooming the cuddly toy we gave her after Lilly passed away and isn't eating as well as she should and Harvey is only 3 months old with our vet saying not to neuter him until he is 5 months old, so we could otherwise not introduce them for another 2,5 months by which time Dottie will have been on her own for three months ...

Your help so far is much appreciated! I'll try and post updates as we go along.

I hope it all goes successfully for you.

The risk of introducing them before he is neutered is a possible falling out once his hormones kick in.

I had two bucks from our local petshop who fought badly once this happened and had to be separated for months to a) get over their neuters and b) forget each other completely (sight, sound, smell).

In my case I felt it was worth separating them for so long in order to give their rebonding every chance. (Wanted it to be autumn as well as this is a less excitable time of year for them).

They were rebonded in October 2013 with two does and have been a happy quad ever since.

Hope that whatever you decide goes well for you and your rabbits. Keep us posted. I love bonding stories.