Bonded Pair Fighting

I have no idea what’s caused my rabbits to fall out and I’m not great with bonding so was wondering if anybody had any ideas..

I have a pair of NZW twin brothers, they will be two in October and have never been separate since the day they were born. They are glued at the hip.
I have had them for around 18 months and they were neutered before they came to me.

I’ve never had issues with them fighting, aside from the odd bum nip and chase lasting no more than about 10 seconds before they were happy with each other again.

They were absolutely fine this morning. They like to come out in the run for an hour or so after they are opened up then have their breakfast about an hour later. At some point in the hour between the shed being opened and going back to give them breakfast they had fought. Fur in the shed and fur in the run and they’d upturned their water bowl which they never do. One boy goes near the other then they start chasing one another. They settle back down then it all starts again. The only time they’ve sat happily next to each other is to eat!

Im not really sure what to do. For now just keeping a very close eye on them but will most likely have to mesh their shed in half as I wouldn’t like to leave them alone just in case.

Has anything changed? I know that on occasions it can be caused by fright - such as the presence a cat or fox.
I'll bump up so you may get some advice.

Thank you.
No nothing. They were happy at 8.30am, couldn’t stand each other by 9.30am.
I did wonder if something spooked them. They are both a bit jumpy as it is, but no way to know for certain.

Could one be feeling "under the weather" and the other one is taking advantage?

tonibun said:

Could one be feeling "under the weather" and the other one is taking advantage?

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They don’t seem to be but I’m going to try get into the vet tomorrow for a check up.
One boy will be sat quite happily relaxing but his brother seems to just sit and watch him and the minute happy brother moves he is ready to pounce at him.

I’m just at a loss what to do. For now the shed is meshed in half so they can’t get at each other but they are still together.

Bump

It's already been mentioned, but it's likely to be either something that has spooked them and is causing referred aggression, or one isn't well and his brother has sensed it. I would take them both to the vet if you can. If one smells different on his return, it could aggravate the aggression. The journey may also (with a bit of luck) re-boot the bond.

Lots of vibes for yoyr boys, hope they sort it out

My bonded male/female pair had been together for 5 or 6 years no problem. They suddenly started scrapping and fur pulling to the extent that we were working out how to divide up the shed so they could live seperately. We tried locking them in the shed, so they had a smaller space to try and reinforce the bond, but when we let them out it was back to square one. I randomly looked out of the window one afternoon to see a wild rabbit on the garden path, I wouldn’t have expected to see one in this area. After we shooed it out of the garden, we secured the boundaries it so it couldn’t get back in and bunnies were absolutely fine after that. I would never have considered referred aggression (they couldn’t shoo off the wild bun, so fought themselves) as the cause if I hadn’t seen that wildie. Hope you can persuade them to be friends again.

Thanks all. I’m swaying more towards the referred aggression given it all kicked off suddenly in the space of an hour. They do both get spooked so easily as it is.
Going to try and get them into the vets today though just for a check up.

*Bex* said:

Thanks all. I’m swaying more towards the referred aggression given it all kicked off suddenly in the space of an hour. They do both get spooked so easily as it is.
Going to try and get them into the vets today though just for a check up.

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Good luck, hope they both get on ok at vets, and brotherly love is soon resumed x