Advice for bonding sick bunnies ?

If you've seen our posts recently - you'll know we've just had Yalta our 3 year old ND spayed on Wednesday - and that Jaro our 6 year old is going through all sorts with EC, ear infections and partial blindness.

Is it advisable to bond ill bunnies ? - and how soon can we try since Yalta was only done 4 days ago.

We're keen to get them together for comfort / support - assuming of course that they get on.

thanks

Martin

Bdonging is stressfull so I'd go with the softly softly approach. What are they're living arrangements? Can you set them up so they're next to each other but no in together? That way they can start learning each others scent. You'll also get a good indication of how they react to each other. If you can get them to the stage where they're lying next to each other with just mesh between then when you remove the mesh they are likely to bond much more quickly.

I'd a good idea to wait a couple of weeks after a spay so the bun is healed inside. That gives Jaro sometime to get on the mend too.

Tam

Thanks Tamsin,

atm Jaro is upstairs - he has the run of one of the rooms and is let into our bedroom for most of the day too.

Yalta is downstairs in the computer room.

The upstairs rooms are pretty big - there is easily enough room to section off part of it and put Yalta in and leave enough room for both - at least its bringing the female into the male's territory too.

We've got some barriers that we got to section off Yalta form the computer that we could use upstairs too.

For the bonding sessions we thought of using the bathroom as 'nuetral' space.

Would we need to intoroduce them in nuetral territory first if we were going to place Yalta in a sectioned off area ?

We'll leave it a while - at least until Jaro is on more of an even keel - and that Yalta is more herself after the op.

Thanks

Martin

The sectioned off area stage would come before the neutral bathroom stage although the two could overlap. The idea is they start of bonding between the bars so by the time they actually get to together they're part bonded anyway which hopefully means less time & stress.

Once you see how they react through the bars you'll get a better idea of how long things will take and how to progress. You never know - it might be love at first sniff

Tam

Tamsin said:

You never know - it might be love at first sniff

Tam

Click to expand...

We hope so

we got Yalta for company for Jaro 3 years ago - but with her health problems, her spaying kept getting put off. We took the plunge last week because of the increasing risks of not getting her done, and that she seemed fairly well over the last few weeks.

It seems to have gone well enough - she is close to her normal self - just not quite as energetic yet.

How long do you think we should leave it before putting them together (with screens) ?


Thanks,
Martin + Pam

If they're not in together then she's probably okay now as he can't get at her to mount etc. so he can't hurt her. So when ever Jaro is feeling up to it.

Tam