Bonding a free roam?

[Abbie Y]

I have a beautiful spayed free roam girl, Carmello who has free range of the entire upstairs of our house. We just put in paperwork to adopt a mini-Rex named Mocha and we get to bring him home on Tuesday! He was just neutered 5 days ago. I’m looking for advice on how we should handle this. We do not want Carmello to be caged, as she is already free range and has never lived in a cage while we have had her. Currently, our plan is to set up a play pen in our room in a space she doesn’t normally go, for Mocha to live in. We are planning to cover the sides of the pen with blankets/towels so they can’t see each other to fight through the holes. We aren’t planning to start any dates of the bonding process for another 3 weeks so he can get the hormones out of his system. Will this be okay? Any other tips/tricks/guidance is greatly appreciated!

[Doodler]

Hi Abbie Y and welcome!

When you first bring the new guy home I would definitely give him time to get used to his new home. If it were me I would have him in a room where Carmello won’t be able to even get to at least until he’s comfortable with his new surroundings. Once he’s comfortable you can start prebonding, which is swapping their litter boxes, toys, dishes, etc. I think it’s very important to have them be able to see each other and interact from a safe distance when doing this process. It’s normally best if they can live side by side with a gap of at least 6″ between them but I understand that Carmello may spend some of her time throughout the rest of the house as well. My buck is free roam in his own room and I thought it would be okay if I set up my second bunny elsewhere and had them have play time next to each other along with swapping items. This didn’t work. I ended up having to set up a pen for my first bunny and had them live next to each other and swapped their pens every day before I tried bonding them again. It broke my heart to do this but I knew it was something I had to do. It helped greatly but sadly I lost my second bunny before they were able to be bonded.

For my second bonding I just couldn’t bring myself to move my buck out of his room again. I ended up moving my new doe into his room and had them share the room. My doe had a cage with a pen attached. While I was litter box training her she would spend the time I couldn’t watch her closed in her cage and during this time I would collapse the pen so my buck could use her area. I also swapped their items and I think both of these things helped do a similar thing to the pen swapping as far getting them used to each other’s scents and losing track of what they thought was theirs. I was shocked that through that whole time neither of them did any territorial marking. After doing this prebonding for a month I was able to successfully bond them in about 3 weeks. There were a couple of days of territorial marking during the bonding time but I was able to move them back into this same room with no territorial issues.

Honestly what you may have to do has a lot to do with how compatible they are. I can’t say that if I had followed the same process I used the second time it would have worked for the first pair since clearly they were a more difficult match from the start.

The other issue with bonding a free roam bunny is having neutral territory to bond them in. It’s actually best to have multiple places in mind because you may have to change things up. That was an issue I ran into because I didn’t have much to work with since my buck had been almost everywhere in my house.

In the bonding section I do have a topic about my second bonding experience and it ended up basically being a bonding journal if you wanted to see what I dealt with but I tend to be long winded.

Thank you for giving another bunny a home and good luck with them! It’s such a joy watching a bonded pair.

[Abbie Y]

This is so helpful and such great advice! We do have a spot that we’ll do the bonding in (Carmello doesn’t go downstairs so we have a bunch of neutral territory down there)! I think we will try to set Mocha up in the spare bedroom then, based on your advice—at least until we know how their play dates are going. We already have stuffed animals, toys, blankets and shirts that we are planning to swap during the “prebonding” phase. We have had Carmello since November, and this is our first time being bunny owners and trying to bond! They seemed to have a good connection at the shelter (we took Carmello to make sure she picked her own friend, as she was the most important part of this process). I’ll definitely check out your section! Thank you! My biggest worry was putting her in a pen/cage because she hasn’t had to live that way with us—she tends to be a bit of a diva sometimes, so we don’t want to upset her! It will definitely be a learning curve would you mind if I reach out to you if I have any other questions as the process unfolds?

[Doodler]

I am glad to help! I would recommend starting a bonding topic when you start bonding if you have any questions, or of course beforehand if a question comes up. I am far from an expert but I am more than willing to share my experience. I find it’s always nice to see if people can give you a variety of opinions, especially since not all bonding is the same. Sometimes it’s a trial and error type process. I didn’t really get a variety of opinions for my questions but one of the forum leaders DanaNM took us under her wing and helped us through it. She knows way more than I do. Please send me a DM when you do have a question and I will be sure to subscribe and help in any way I can. Please be sure to post pictures too!

Edited to add:  I did want to clarify what you meant by how their play dates are going.  What kind of play dates are you referring to?  I just wanted to make sure you weren’t doing play dates before doing a prebonding and bonding.  I would recommend once he is comfortable at home to allow them in the same room and actually have them in that room as much as possible as part of your prebonding process.  I just find it’s important to have them see each other and get used to each other’s presence.  You just want to make sure they can’t get to each other to nip, box or fight in any way so that is why I used the pen around the pen barricade. 

[TwoBunsNYC]

Can you share the link of your bonding journal? I am having issues bonding a new bunny with my free roam adult Lionhead.

[Bam]

Here’s a link to Doodle’s bonding thread:

https://binkybunny.com/FORUM/tabid/54/aft/170478/Default.aspx

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