Bonding Ham & Bea Take Two

Hi everyone :wave:

This weekend we're attemping to bond Ham and Bea again. It has been seven weeks since their operations now.

So far it is going better in the sense that Ham is not mounting her as much, he does seem calmer. They've been in for about an hour together now. Beatrice just seems completely indifferent towards him though, even fed up with him. She's staying in her litter tray still as a statue, because whenever she moves Ham runs over and starts to bother her again, pulling her fur and mounting her.

Is it normal for this to happen at this stage? I feel really bad because she doesn't seem to want the attention he's giving her and I don't want to force her to put up with it.

Obviously it is early on and I've never bonded rabbits before, so I don't know what is classified as normal/natural behaviour at this point?

It is quite normal, ime, for the male to pester the female, well that's what he would do in the wild? It is equally normal for the female to play hard to get for about 3 days, in which time the male has taken his mind off chasing her! Give them a fair amount of healthy treats as this helps the bonding and try not to separate now. Plenty of hay to munch is good also. Good luck.

Thank you tonibun. That is reassuring to me. I really appreciate the advice. I'll keep you updated

It may also help to remove the litter tray so that there is nothing either Rabbit can try to claim ownership of x

Good luck with the bonding!

When I bonded my pair they started off similarly to your two, except it was the other way round! After ignoring each other for a while the girl bunny kept pestering the boy (although not actually humping) while he looked really miserable at being there for the first couple of days. After a few days they were successfully bonded.

It's hard at first because you do feel bad for them (and they're really good at making you feel guilty even though you're doing a nice thing for them!) but it's all worth it in the end when you see them happily cuddled up with their new friend [emoji3]


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tonibun said:

It is quite normal, ime, for the male to pester the female, well that's what he would do in the wild? It is equally normal for the female to play hard to get for about 3 days, in which time the male has taken his mind off chasing her! Give them a fair amount of healthy treats as this helps the bonding and try not to separate now. Plenty of hay to munch is good also. Good luck.

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Tonibun has given you good advice

Lots of treats - I use herbs and forage to distract ....

Lots of luck :wave:

I was wondering how the bonding went?

Thanks for the advice and support everyone, sorry I haven't been able to get back on here sooner!

To summarise, we kept them in our cold outbuilding on Saturday and Sunday to bond. On Saturday there was a lot of fur pulling and humping from Ham, but by Sunday they were a lot calmer and washing each other a lot. On Monday they went back out into the greenhouse hutch/run setup, with just half of the run so not to give them too much space too soon. We have given them the whole run today as it's very raining and they were turning the grass into a mud bath in the small patch they had.

I'm a bit concerned though, because even before they had more space today, I noticed that Ham has been constantly bothering Beatrice, following her everywhere and constantly trying to mount her. She's been hiding behind a log in the corner most of the day. I don't think she's actually been back in the hutch the past two days, and usually she'll spend a lot of time sleeping upstairs and eating hay. I'm worried that he's exausting her. She hasn't been terrotorial over her hutch at all, it's like she's too scared to go in it.

I went out earlier and picked her up to put her upstairs because she was soaking, she lay down for a couple of minutes until Ham 'found her' and tried to hump her again, so she ran back out of the hutch. He was neutered 8 weeks ago and does have quiet patches in which he leaves her alone. I'm still concered overall though. I don't know if it's him being dominant/protective, but he seems to get a lot more chasey when I enter the run, like he thinks I'm going to steal her away.

Do people think this sounds normal at this stage, or should I be worried? Beatrice has shown affection towards him, but he's still constantly bothering her, to the extent that I'm worried she hasn't slept for a couple of days. Any advice is really appreciated, thank you.

It sounds like you have been kept busy! I know you sound concerned for Beatrice but at least they are still together after 4 days and soon things have to calm down. They had 2 days in the outbuilding and then they were moved to their hutch/run so it was like a new start. I feel fairly confident that by tomorrow or Thursday ham will start to behave normally. I would think they probably sleep most of the night so Bea will be getting some rest then. Do they eat close together yet?

tonibun said:

It sounds like you have been kept busy! I know you sound concerned for Beatrice but at least they are still together after 4 days and soon things have to calm down. They had 2 days in the outbuilding and then they were moved to their hutch/run so it was like a new start. I feel fairly confident that by tomorrow or Thursday ham will start to behave normally. I would think they probably sleep most of the night so Bea will be getting some rest then. Do they eat close together yet?

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Thank you tonibun, that is reassuring! Yes, they eat right next to each other Neither of them have shown any signs of aggression or being territorial throughout the whole process, which is great.

Another issue is that the cleanliness situation has gone completely out the window - before Ham joined her Beatrice had the tidiest setup, she only ever pooped in her litter tray, not on the grass or elsewhere in the hutch, so it was all quite managable to maintain. This morning I spent an hour cleaning out the hutch (there was wee all over the laminate and poop everywhere), also the run is completely covered. I tried putting some of the droppings into their litter trays today to encourage them, which does seem to have had at least a slight effect because the hutch was looking at lot cleaner tonight than it did last night. The grass is still covered in sludgey droppings though, thanks to the rain. I'm hoping once again that it's just a settling down period thing, because both of them used their litter trays religiously in the past, even Ham got the hang of it eventually. So fingers crossed

It's odd how changes can set their litter habits backwards but hopefully in a few days they will settle into their old clean habits. I bet you are really pleased at seeing them together, it's one of the things I love most about rabbits. And eating close together means a successful bond.

tonibun said:

It's odd how changes can set their litter habits backwards but hopefully in a few days they will settle into their old clean habits. I bet you are really pleased at seeing them together, it's one of the things I love most about rabbits. And eating close together means a successful bond.

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I'm in agreement tonibun, it's so nice finally seeing them together. They both seem more active in general now that they have company, it's really lovely to see

2017-11-27_08-26-50 by Rachel Brown, on Flickr

I took this photo this morning

The only problem is they're still pooping everywhere, all over the run...never in the hutch/their litter trays. They hardly seem to use the hutch now they they're together, actually :roll:

The grass is suffering a bit because of the constant pooping, so I'm wondering how I can get them back into the habit of using a litter tray. I'm debating getting a little hut like this to put in the run:

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Bunny-Business-Rabbit-Guinea-House/dp/B006OMZ170/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1511771586&sr=8-1&keywords=rabbit+hut

And then moving the hay feeder (currently near the door in the run) to here, so that if they want to eat hay they'll also be sitting in the tray? The thing is they're going all over the run, so I don't know if it will even make a difference. They don't seem to have a 'poop spot'. Before they were together Bea used her tray religiously and the grass was nice for her to graze on, now it is unrecognisable!

Aww what a lovely photo litter training often goes out the window in new bonds, or even rabbits moved to new territory. Territorial pooping should get better. If you can somehow clean up the poops it helps but on grass it's difficult. Grass in a run usually gets eaten and turns to a brown mess within a few days I'm afraid :shock: extra hay filled trays are a good idea, those shelters are handy too

Nice to see them together Some rabbits like to mark their territory - I have slabs down as grass doesn't tend to work, and I brush the poops up every evening. The bunnies also have one or two litter trays but it makes no difference and of course it's more natural for them to do their toilet on grass. I bought one of those houses but mine never bothered with it :roll: Perhaps you should consider slabs as it isn't very healthy imo to have poohs that get wet in the rain. It isn't easy getting everything right for rabbits especially their diet. They certainly keep us on our toes!

Beapig said:

I'm in agreement tonibun, it's so nice finally seeing them together. They both seem more active in general now that they have company, it's really lovely to see

2017-11-27_08-26-50 by Rachel Brown, on Flickr

I took this photo this morning

The only problem is they're still pooping everywhere, all over the run...never in the hutch/their litter trays. They hardly seem to use the hutch now they they're together, actually :roll:

The grass is suffering a bit because of the constant pooping, so I'm wondering how I can get them back into the habit of using a litter tray. I'm debating getting a little hut like this to put in the run:

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Bunny-Business-Rabbit-Guinea-House/dp/B006OMZ170/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1511771586&sr=8-1&keywords=rabbit+hut

And then moving the hay feeder (currently near the door in the run) to here, so that if they want to eat hay they'll also be sitting in the tray? The thing is they're going all over the run, so I don't know if it will even make a difference. They don't seem to have a 'poop spot'. Before they were together Bea used her tray religiously and the grass was nice for her to graze on, now it is unrecognisable!

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Look at those two, they look fantastic together

Did you ever find a vet with the RHD2 vaccine?

MightyMax said:

Look at those two, they look fantastic together

Did you ever find a vet with the RHD2 vaccine?

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I called up my regular vet again today and they still didn't have it, so I tried another vet in my city and we were in luck! They're both getting vaccinated tomorrow morning