9 Week old Rex attacks wife but not me

[PepperRex]

Hi Guys

I have been reading up on rabbit behavior and we seem to have a issue with a new 9 week old mini rex. 

She has been home for about a week she lives in a hutch during the day and night, when we are home she has free run of the place. She seems quite happy running and jumping around the place.

A few days in she started attacking my wife she would run at her hands and just bite her hard, she can pat her,pick her up  and hand feed her etc but when she is playing or being frisky she will come in for a quick nibble find a bit of skin and bite her hard. The wife then lets out a big EEEEEK and turns her back on her.

The rabbit is fine with me she will snifff around my hands i might get a little nibble and the odd bite but nothing that seem this aggressive.

Will the EEEK training work or has my rabbit decided to take a dislike to the wife.

Cheers

 

[Stickerbunny]

My rex girl used to nip me all the time, but she adores my partner and never has him. After her spay, she stopped doing it so much. But, she still runs up and gives me the occasional nip if I am cleaning her litterbox or touching her stuff. I taught her not to do it hard though by every time she would nip me, I would say “no” and push her gently away from me, holding her away so she couldn’t nip again. I kept treats on me, so when she came up to me nicely, I would give her a tiny treat, if she came up to nip me, she’d get told no and pushed away.

Yours is still pretty young, so I imagine you haven’t introduced fresh to her yet. In which case, treat bribing won’t work yet. Tell your wife instead of an EEEEEK make a high pitched squeal, like a rabbit being hurt. Turning her back is good. It’s normal for bunnies to nip each other, it’s part of communication and your baby probably just hasn’t learned how to communicate with humans yet.

Also, remember bunnies are very sensitive to smells and such. So, if your wife wears perfume, hand lotion, nail polish etc she could try leaving it off one day and seeing if maybe the bun just isn’t a fan of her personal product smells (also, if your wife pets a cat or dog at a friends or something, she’ll smell of predator). If I smell off to my girl, she’ll thump and run away from me.

And, for initial bonding, it’s good to let the rabbit make the first moves. She can try laying in the floor and ignore the bunny, see if she still attacks. Best to wear thicker clothing when doing this in case of nipping.

[PepperRex]

Thanks for the advice,

Pepper is a lot better with the wife now. Turns out it was olive oil that she was using for a hand moisturiser.

Pepper loves it so anything with oil on it gets chomped.

Pepper is quite a cheeky thing at the moment, she has taken to peeing on couch and on top of the couch. We keep moving her down and back onto the floor and telling her no. If she looks like she is going to pee then we quickly put her in the litter basket and keep reinforcing the litter training.

Just had a incident when the wife was putting pepper down on the floor repeatedly she would race back up onto the couch thump at her and pee all down the back of it.  

The cheek of it.

[JackRabbit]

Bunnies, particularly in-tact hormonal teenage bunnies, like to pee on soft things that smell like their humans (bed, sofa, etc). Sounds like your bunny is claiming the sofa and your wife tried to keep her from doing so. I would try to block her access to the sofa until she is spayed and her hormones calm down.

Don’t you just love a bun with a little attitude?! My Marlee is a little diva thumper too!

[Author]

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