Second rabbit - questions

[odyssey~]

Hello!

There is a chance that I may be able to get a second rabbit to bond with Odyssey sometime soon!
I had a few questions regarding a second bunny

Odyssey's current cage is 23 sq ft. It's a 4x2 pet store cage connected to a 5x3 pen. If I were to extend it to make the pen 5x4 and then add on a 2x3 extention to one side of the pen would that be large enough for two bunnies as a night time cage? It's 34 sq ft.

I've heard side by side living is a good way to start off to get them used to each other. Due to space constraints, this isn't possible- would switching their cage accessories like their litter box, fleece, etc work? Also, would having a common playtime area work too? They won't be out at the same time before they are bonded but they will be able to go up to each other's cages.

I heard that the cage that they are in after being completly bonded should be neutral, so no smells of the other bunnys. Does this mean I need new towels/fleece or is washing it okay? Also, do I need to buy need towels/fleece for the new bunny's cage or is Odyssey's washed ones okay?

Thank you!

 

[BunsFurever]

ohh cool! i think that size would be fine. I just switched Tinkerbell and Ferdinand’s accessories and they were fine about it! I think washing it would be okay.

 

[Catlyn]

In my experience, having pens side by side hasn't worked the best- the buns would grunt at, nip and chase each other along their enclosures, and after blanketing the perimeter, they'd still nudge under to go and annoy the other.

Swapping enclosure elements has been working for us. When doing this, there's no need to wash anything unless it's just dirty. Better yet, while pre-bonding Storm with Iris, i would outright swap their bases so that Iris could safely excersise, considering that her area used to be much smaller than his. This also helped establish Iris as a future inhabitant of the larger enclosure.

Mutual playtime space is also a nice way to make sure that both rabbits' scents are lingering in the house so that they'd have less potenital for a territorial dispute. You do need to be careful anytime they'd meet at the bars so that they wouldn't box or nip the other while paying a visit.

It is a nice thing to have the duo's area as neutral as possible, but depending on the rabbits, it doesn't have to be extremely neutral either.
I did this by object-swapping and rabbit-swapping between the two's pens as part of pre-bonding. When i decided to continue bonding in Storm's pen, i put both rabbits' interiors in there to let them know that this space is both of theirs. I reckon that temporarily removing all interior aside from a neutral toilet and hidy hut would give the same result.
You can just wash the blankets and it'd be enough, no need to buy completely new ones. If you wanted to start pre-bonding earlier, you could just give the new bun an unwashed fleece of Odyssey's to see how they fare. Why fix something when it isn't broken?