Post Discipline Behaviors :(

[kuniklos]

I have had General Bismark for a little over a month, and he's was neutered a month ago as well. He's 10 months old and have been a very playful and affectionate bunny, although not the cuddly type. He would hop up on your lap anywhere you sat and would hand out. Crawl all over you, come when you call, and follow you around.

But he had a very bad digging clothing and biting habit. I have several bits of skin gored out of me by him. And when he latches on....it's blood or nothing. But it's not in a mean way. He'll start licking your clothes, dig for a second (and if you don't react fact enough...) and then bite. Afterwards when you squeal, he hops away with binkies.

I tried squealing when he hurt me. He'd stop, look at me, and a few minutes later go back to it. I'm certain he likes the sound because it always ends with him in binkies. But this is very much not a game for me!

So I tried the spray bottle....and he liked it as well. :grumpy: He'd shake his head, stand on his back legs, and try to lick the bottle in my hand.

Three days ago I decided to just pick him up off me the moment he starts digging and putting him on the ground and ignoring him. But he'd hop back up. In a 5 minutes period I may need to put him down 10 times. So then I began just putting him in his cage for a few minutes when he'd start digging.

Then suddenly a few hours later he stopped doing it. And stopped coming near me or my fiance at all. He's become, a dare say, down right skiddish, untrusting, and scared of us. He bonded to us so quickly, but now I feel like we "lost him".

What the heck did I do wrong? Is he punishing me for trying to discipline him? Two days of no love is worrying me.

 

[Runestonez]

Digging, "love"nips and bites are part of normal rabbit behavior...
Since he was a mature neuter it will take a while for his hormones to settle down.

Our male was doing this and it took about 3 months for him to stop the digging and nipping.
He has been neutered since beginning of December and has dropped back to once or twice a week doing the digging thing and not so much with the nipping!
To a rabbit the digging and nipping is a show of affection...nevermind that on hairless humans it isn't half as amusing as it is to rabbits! :grumpy:

If you are worried about him being upset by being locked up...
you can try what we did...when we would sit on the couch we would bring a stuffed bunny doll with us...so when Samhain started digging we would distract him with his stuffy...it usually ended in us tossing the stuffy on the floor and him humping it until he collapsed! lol :biggrin:
And then he would be fine again for awhile! So we would just do the same thing over and over...he has a friend now to groom and cuddle and I don't get bitten anymore.

 

[kuniklos]

Good to hear. I didn't know if it was an affection thing or not, but I'm quite tired of bleeding every day from his "kisses". So I suppose I should just suck it up until he grows out of it? I hate that our relationship so quickly changed because I needed to spurn him.