Bonded pair are nipping

[Jazlyn]

I have two bonded rabbits, they’ve been together since birth, and lately they’ve been nipping. They’re two unneutered males. I know I need to get them fixed as they’ve been spraying their pee along with a few other issues. Is this an issue that’ll go away after I fix them? I don’t want them to start getting agressive with each other.

[sarahthegemini]

You need to separate them and keep them apart until at least a month after they’ve been neutered. Then you can bond them. How old are they?

[tobyluv]

If they are 3 months of age or so, they are entering puberty. The hormones that come with puberty can cause more than just nipping. Rabbits can fight and can severely injure each other, so they should be separated now. As Sarah said, you need to wait a month after their surgery to start rebonding them. Besides causing injuries if they fight, rabbits can hold a grudge. If one or both gets injured or feels like he’s being attacked, they may not want to bond later on.

[Jazlyn]

They’re around 9 months now, and it’s their first time doing this. My mom is the one who saw it and it hasn’t happened so far with me watching. They’ve been together since birth and have never nipped before. Will neutering stop this behaviour? They haven’t fought before, but they occasionally chase each other a bit.

[Jazlyn]

Perhaps she thought it was nipping but it wasn’t. I’ll have to watch them closely tonight and see. My vet has done a surgery on one of my rabbits before thankfully, so I know I can trust him. I do want them both neutered but I was hoping I could wait a bit longer as one of them just recovered 3 months ago.

[tobyluv]

I’m surprised that there hasn’t been more than nipping or chasing with 2 unneutered rabbits of that age. Maybe they are late bloomers, but you really should keep them separated now before things escalate and you end up with injuries or rabbits that come to dislike each other and cannot be bonded. You didn’t say what your rabbit was recovering from, but the vet should know if he is able to have surgery now. Neutering should stop the nipping and spraying.

[Jazlyn]

Thanks for the advice!
He had to get amputated after he got himself wrapped in a blanket while I was out running errands. I went to the wrong vet, who claimed they could treat rabbits, and he gave me bad advice.
I’m thinking they may be late bloomers, but they’ve mounted each other and have been spraying their pee, along with a few other indications of hormones, since they were 3 months. They haven’t had any issues since this morning though, if I notice any agression towards each other tonight, I am certainly keeping them apart while unsupervised. They’re both very submissive personalities so I suppose thats why they’ve never had problems before. Neither are really the dominant bunny.

[Jazlyn]

But the advice has certainly been useful, I’m going to watch them for a while longer to see if they show any aggression. If so, they won’t be staying together unless I’m around. I’m calling in the morning to see about neutering, I’m okay with rebonding them if it means they don’t hurt the other.

[Deleted User]

You should definitely keep them apart until they have both been neutered and for the few weeks after as others have advised on here. Even if you have seen no other signs of aggression and it seems like a one time thing. This has recently happened to me and I naively presumed that because both my male rabbits were bought from the store at the same time that they were ‘bonded’. They got on really well from the start. Then I got them both neutered and kept them together after this. Which about 2 weeks after resulted in an attack in the night from one rabbit to the other and a piece of his ear was torn off. This completely shocked me as there were no indicators of aggression before this. It is only now, several weeks later that I feel confident in keeping them together. But this has taken a lot of worrying and time working with them to be sure it is safe. there is so much advice on here that I have taken on board and it’s really worthwhile reading everything you can find out about rabbit behaviour and bonding. Even though it may look like the rabbits are fine together there is probably a lot more going on between them. At times my two looked lost without each other when I separated them but I knew I had to be 100% confident otherwise I couldn’t have forgiven myself if anything else had happened.

Thankfully my two have just had their first night back together last night and they couldn’t be happier. I really don’t think I would have got to this point if it hadn’t been for all the info on here

[Author]

Messages