Bonding not going good. Please help.

[CrispSarnie]

Hello everyone.
I am a new user and if this post isn’t allowed because its already asked please remove it.

My situation is this. I have a neutered male lop, he is the first rabbit I’ve had and he’s 11mnths I’ve had him 6 months and wanted to get him a friend. So I now have a neutered female lop she is also 11 months.
I have read up on bonding and followed the guidelines for bonding these two. Everything was going great after 5 days they were playing together eating together chilling together and she was grooming him. This all was happening in my upstairs bedroom which was neutral. They started in a small space and it gradually got bigger. After day four and five of grooming and chilling, I tried them in the downstairs room nearer their hutches. And everything went bad. She started chasing him which I broke up. But then out of nowhere she grabbed him and they started fighting. I broke it up with water after only a second or two.that was yesterday. I have tried them again today in a small covered space because i thought they had too much room, but within seconds she did the same thing. Lunged at him grabbed him and they got into another fight. Which again I broke up with water. I suspect thus is because I changed the room? But I have no experience with this. Have I ruined this? Any help is very appreciated.
Thank you.

[Dee]

You haven’t ruined it ☺! I’m no bonding expert, but sounds to me like she got territorial when they moved closer to get hutch, even though she’s new. Does can be very crabby when it comes to their personal space. I’m having a similar problem- we moved to a whole new house (not just for the rabbits lol- I’m crazy but not that bad yet!). It was going fine until my female bunny decided the cardboard hidey box was for her alone, and began popping out and going after her little husbun whenever he came near. Ugh, so frustrating.

If I were you, I’d go back to the upstairs bedroom, if you haven’t already. If they are still fighting, a break for a few days or a week might help. Once you get that back to the point where you’re ready to go back near the hutches, I would give everything a thorough cleaning with vinegar, maybe put down some cheap new rugs, just make the place as unfamiliar as possible. Hopefully that will help. I get what you’re going through- bunnies are so hard to figure out, and it’s scary when they fight! My boy bunny scratched my lady bun when I first brought them home and they got together accidentally, and she needed to go for stitches! Ever since then I’ve just been off the chain about any type of aggression. But some nipping, humping, lunging and fur pulling is normal. It’s just telling when it’s getting too serious, that to me is the hard part.

Good luck and please keep us posted!

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