Bunny behavior questions

[polyneux]

We recently adopted a bunny from someone on craigslist.

This bunny has always exhibited strange behavior,

If we open the cage she will jump out and hop around and sometimes come up to us, she always runs from a petting hand though.

She is also very defensive over anything cage related, at night when she is in the cage and I go to put her food bowl in, she lunges and knocks the bowl clean out of my hand. She also frequently tosses her food bowl over...

She lunges at anything in and around her cage, or if she is under my bed and I go down to see her she will start lunging on hind legs like a boxer

She also growls and grunts a lot


A lot...

Shes like a little grumpy old woman the amount that she growls...

I've read they aren't supposed to make much noise, but she eats and drinks regularly, and investigates things, shows no other sign of distress or sickness.

We had to pick her up once to trim her nails (they were tearing up the carpet) and that was an adventure...but once we had her she seemed fine, I held her in my lap and clipped her nails without having to hold her down, and when done she let me pet her for a while just sitting in my lap until she ran off.

getting her in the cage at night is becoming a problem too.

Any advice?


We recently adopted another bunny (house is big enough to keep them separate) from a close friend. We had them meet once and though she is half his size she still nips and bites and growls at him.

She also grinds her teeth a lot too..

Bottom line....is she sick? Scared? Pretty much every time we come around she flinches, ears down, and goes into attack mode, from day one...

She is approximately a year old, unspayed (working on that)

Some kind of dwarf, rather unsure...most likely netherland

 

[elrohwen]

She just sounds very territorial. This behavior is fairly typical in many unspayed females.

 

[funnybunnymummy]

I'd say "unspayed Netherland Dwarf" pretty much sums it up.

She's likely to retain some of these behaviours after she's spayed. She sounds like she's a dominant bun. I've got a dominant bun too.

If he lunges or boxes at me or tries nipping, even if he just starts nudging me out of his space, I push him away and, if necessary, push his head down. Letting him push you around is the worse thing to do, so don't let her do it. She'll probably always push the limits, but you just have to show her you're not afraid of her and you're thetop bunny.

Hope that helps!

Rue

 

[kirbyultra]

Well, it does sound like unspayed netherland dwarf... but...

The only thing that sticks out to me is the teeth grinding. They do a tooth purr if they are happy and comfy (usually triggered by some happy event like you petting them) but teeth grinding can also be an indication of pain. I have seen buns that eat and poop perfectly fine but have other things wrong with them that are NOT apparent without further examination by a rabbit savvy vet, and they express their discomfort through aggression.

I don't know that this is the case here, or if it's just simply hormonal behavior. But if you're thinking of spaying her have the vet look her over closely and voice these concerns and behaviors.

 

[funnybunnymummy]

Oh, good point. Could she have ear mites or fleas? I know Gus was much more aggressive before we treated him. He had quite the personality change after that. Still not a cuddly rabbit, but he's become much less stand-off-ish.

Hope that helps!

Rue