Yet another bonding question

I have three rabbits (2 female) and one male all spayed/neutered.

The two girls were bought together as babies and "bonded" until their teenage urges got the better of them. I separated them and then had them both spayed. They are now just over a year old.

I have started to bond one female with the male, to the stage where they happily share the same run, but the female tries her hardest to ignore the male. No fights or scraps have broken out, the male has even given up trying to mount her!

The other female currently has the biggest housing area (originally built for the two girls!). Out of interest, I tried the two females together tonight, thinking that ideally it would be good for them to share the larger housing area. (The male, currently lives blissfully with a male guinea pig). And maybe all three rabbits could enjoy supervised sessions toegther in the garden run.

Now two females have both been housed next to each other (3 inch gap) for the last 2-3 months.

I put them a divided run and they seemed happy to sniff each other through the bars and generally ignore each other.

After a while, I my curiosity got the better of me and I removed the barrier. They both sniffed each other and seemed quite placid for a short while and then all hell broke loose. I now know what a real rabbit fight looks like. I separated them once to try to calm them down, but they just went for each other again. So I took one out of the run, before they hurt each other. (The session ended with me shaking as much as them!)

I accept that I should have tried a few more "divided run" sessions, but do you think this pairing will work again?

I read about having them both on your lap etc, but neither like being picked up and one is very very timid and squirms like mad when handled.

help......


Cristian

You could try putting them both in a carrier and going for a drive on the car, just make sure you have another person with you when you do it.

I would reccomend bonding the male with the more dominant of the females then try and add the other female. That worked great for my trio. When the aggressive rabbit is paired it should settle down a lot.

I would also reccomend that you seperate the male guinea and the bun. Rabbits and piggies have very different dietary needs, cage requirments and behaviors. They don't communicate the same way which can result in the piggie getting hurt and even killed. Lots of times a rabbit will get scared and jump off kicking the piggie in the side or leg which cause massive internal damage. Seperating the two would be beneficial to both of them.

Best Wishes!