henryjamesbunman
New Member
Hi y'all - let me preface this by telling you that I've already called my vet and am waiting to hear back from him, but wanted to talk to some other bunny people in the meantime!
Henry is a roughly 6.5-year-old (he's a rescue, so I don't know for sure) neutered male lionhead. I adopted him in 2008 and he was neutered before he came to live with me. I've NEVER had any issues with hormonal/dominance behavior from him. In the past month or so, a few things have changed with him. First, I think this is the happiest I've ever seen him. He is energetic, happy, inquisitive, constantly binking and looking for pets. His eating/drinking habits are the same and his poops look fine.
However he's had some deterioration of his litterbox habits. It started with him going outside of the litterbox but still in his cage, which I didn't think too much about. Then he started peeing occasionally around the house, but only in three select spots. I spoke to my vet about that, and after hearing that his eating/drinking/behavior was all normal and noting that the urination was in those three same places, my vet thought maybe it was a territorial thing and that perhaps Henry was being harassed by my cats when I wasn't home. I started leaving him in his cage in the morning and letting him out at lunch, and that seemed to fix the problem.
Over the weekend, I noticed Henry chasing/following the cats around. I didn't think too much of it - that's not totally out of the ordinary - but on Saturday night he was aggressive and insistent about it. I finally noticed him coming up behind my cat Sophie, sniffing her and gradually trying to climb on her. I told my boyfriend I was sure he was trying to mount her and my boyfriend thought I was wrong, but later when Sophie was eating dinner Henry came up behind her and I let him go to it, and he mounted and humped her.
Since Saturday night it's gotten progressively and rapidly worse. This morning as soon as I let him out of his cage he went right after her. I picked him up several times and his penis was out, so I'm guessing that means this is sexual rather than dominant. I also heard him honking last night as he tried to do it.
As I said I'm waiting to hear back from my vet and I'm guessing I'll be taking Henry in today or tomorrow, but I wanted to know if anyone has experience with this. I've tried to do some research and have come up with a lot of information about adrenal gland disease/tumors, but it seems relatively rare and I haven't been able to find details. Is there anything else it could be? I know that neutered bunnies act like this sometimes, but since Henry has literally never demonstrated any kind of behavior even close to this, I'm guessing it's not "normal" in our case. Any input would be appreciated.
Other details that may be pertinent: Henry is 100 percent free-range (he only stays in his cage at night), and he has lived peacefully with cats since I brought him home. There have been no changes in our household at all that would have precipitated this, at least not that I can think of - food/pets/inhabitants etc are all the same. I did buy a different kind of bedding last month, but not really - it's the Petco store brand of Carefresh; the consistency/ingredients are exactly the same as far as I can tell.
Henry is a roughly 6.5-year-old (he's a rescue, so I don't know for sure) neutered male lionhead. I adopted him in 2008 and he was neutered before he came to live with me. I've NEVER had any issues with hormonal/dominance behavior from him. In the past month or so, a few things have changed with him. First, I think this is the happiest I've ever seen him. He is energetic, happy, inquisitive, constantly binking and looking for pets. His eating/drinking habits are the same and his poops look fine.
However he's had some deterioration of his litterbox habits. It started with him going outside of the litterbox but still in his cage, which I didn't think too much about. Then he started peeing occasionally around the house, but only in three select spots. I spoke to my vet about that, and after hearing that his eating/drinking/behavior was all normal and noting that the urination was in those three same places, my vet thought maybe it was a territorial thing and that perhaps Henry was being harassed by my cats when I wasn't home. I started leaving him in his cage in the morning and letting him out at lunch, and that seemed to fix the problem.
Over the weekend, I noticed Henry chasing/following the cats around. I didn't think too much of it - that's not totally out of the ordinary - but on Saturday night he was aggressive and insistent about it. I finally noticed him coming up behind my cat Sophie, sniffing her and gradually trying to climb on her. I told my boyfriend I was sure he was trying to mount her and my boyfriend thought I was wrong, but later when Sophie was eating dinner Henry came up behind her and I let him go to it, and he mounted and humped her.
Since Saturday night it's gotten progressively and rapidly worse. This morning as soon as I let him out of his cage he went right after her. I picked him up several times and his penis was out, so I'm guessing that means this is sexual rather than dominant. I also heard him honking last night as he tried to do it.
As I said I'm waiting to hear back from my vet and I'm guessing I'll be taking Henry in today or tomorrow, but I wanted to know if anyone has experience with this. I've tried to do some research and have come up with a lot of information about adrenal gland disease/tumors, but it seems relatively rare and I haven't been able to find details. Is there anything else it could be? I know that neutered bunnies act like this sometimes, but since Henry has literally never demonstrated any kind of behavior even close to this, I'm guessing it's not "normal" in our case. Any input would be appreciated.
Other details that may be pertinent: Henry is 100 percent free-range (he only stays in his cage at night), and he has lived peacefully with cats since I brought him home. There have been no changes in our household at all that would have precipitated this, at least not that I can think of - food/pets/inhabitants etc are all the same. I did buy a different kind of bedding last month, but not really - it's the Petco store brand of Carefresh; the consistency/ingredients are exactly the same as far as I can tell.
