I'm really starting to hate my rabbit.

He's six months old. We've had him for four months, and he isn't neutered. He lives with my boyfriend and I in a rented apartment, and he has destroyed it. Even though we bunny-proofed it, he still finds things to chew on. He's ripped up a ton of carpet and chewed the paint off the walls. There is no way to stop him, as he will run back to the spot no matter how many times we put him back in his cage. He gets aggressive after a while. He has plenty of chew toys that we bought for him but he's never paid any attention to them.

The main problem we have is that he'll have random panic attacks. They're caused by noises; one was a kitten meowing, the other was the sound of a plastic water bottle being squeezed. During these attacks he charges into his cage causing his face/nose/mouth to bleed and screams in pain. I'm scared he's going to have a heart attack one day. I live in constant fear when I'm home alone that I'll have to watch him die. We never know when the next one is going to happen, and it is so stressful.

Any tips/suggestions?

Your in a cycle that is causing more stress and harm to you and your bunny. He runs around, he acts like a typical bunny, you get mad, you probably try to get him away from what he is destroying, he gets stressed and he sees this as attacking him so he gets aggressive and he's forced in his cage either by you or by himself to take refuge, everyone is just stressed out and you do it again the next day. Man I'm stressed out now too lol.

Ok so stop that cycle. First off he needs to get neutered. Second, buy a play pen, you honestly need it and it will save you money in the long run seeing how you have to pay for what he destroys. I don't know what kind of cage you have for him, but right now keep him in there, in a quiteish place. When your home then give him some exercise and let him out in the large play pen where he can't destroy anything. And you really need to be patient and work on your bond with him and this will help relax him and you Bc right now you both are overly stressed and fed up with each other.

Why is his nose/face/mouth bleeding? Does he hit his face on something when he runs in his cage?
My rabbit gets scared really easily and freaks out and runs into her cage, under her hut and stomps her feet. That's normal rabbit behavior.
Please explain these panic attacks more. Are you trying to grab her/calm her/pick her up during them?

He bleeds because he slams his face into his pen. I do not try to grab him, he would never let me. I usually just let it happen, and if I can, I lift his pen up so he can run under it and hide under the couch. Thats where he's trying to go when he does this. He slams into his cage hard enough to the point where he screams. He fits through the inch-wide slots of the pen, and he's a pretty big bunny. As soon as he's done panicking, I go over to him and pet him, feed him some lettuce and then give him some space.

What is his living situation like? Is he in a cage that is always open so he is free range? Is he confined to a pen? Is he locked in his cage when you sleep or when your not home? How big is his cage? Why type of bunny is he? Sorry for the questions I'm just trying to get a sense of what his life is like.

It's okay! His cage is usually open if my boyfriend or I am home. It's closed when we're gone or asleep. His cage is inside of a big play pen, and we let him out of the play pen and roam around the apartment sometimes. We feel bad keeping him in the pen all the time. He's a 6 month old lion head bunny, his cage is somewhat small but that's why he always has access to jump out and into the play pen. I'm attaching a picture; the black bars you see behind him are the bars of his play pen.

❤️❤️ aww he is so cute! I have a 4 month old lionhead.

So he can escape the pen? How often does he have panic attacks and how often does he hit his face? Is he generally happy? does he binkie, flop, and lay around the house at all?

You should get him neutered, which will hopefully chill him out.

I can't fathom how he can run into his cage and hit himself so hard that he bleeds. He must be so stressed out and scared to death. which is why I'm wondering about his behavior in general. Does he appear stressed all the time or does he relax and have fun?

I suggest neutering and finding him a spayed girlfriend. Your rabbit's behavior is typical of the single intact male : he is hormonal, frustrated, stressed and bored which causes him to be destructive, aggressive and have crazy reactions to things. The level of hormones in rabbits is crazy. Some rabbits live well enough with them, but a lot of others really can't deal with them. My rabbit, Tybalt, was a MONSTER before getting neutered (destructive, noisy night and day, spraying urine on walls and furniture... believe me I wanted to kill him). Neutering will bring an immediate amelioration if done before the behavior has set as routine. So I wouldn't wait too much before doing it. Then, you'll need a female rabbit. Some rabbits are really close to their wild roots and terribly skittish. Believe me, I know - Aki, my other rabbit, can't live alone. She lived alone for a few months and she couldn't sleep, was constantly jumping around (like OCD behaviors) and things like going to the vet scared her so bad she was trembling all over and I felt like she would die everytime. Getting her a husbunny helped her tremendously to settle down. When she feels stressed, she cuddles with him and she survives the yearly vaccination and the 4 hour trip to my parents just fine (but I tried getting her to the vet on her own 5 months ago and it was a disaster, so I won't do it again). With a friend, your bunny won't be bored either so he will be less tempted to do naughty things. It won't eliminate potential damages completely because well... rabbits do destroy things (even if they settle down when they grow old - Aki hasn't done anything naughty for years... but she's 7 !), but it will probably be a lot better than before. I suggest going to a rescue and adopting an already spayed young female, it will cost less and will make the bonding process easier.
I think it's the best way to solve your problem. It won't go away an its own, and the more frustrated you'll become, the worse it'll be. Besides, it's a real joy to see two bonded rabbits interacting with each other.

He can escape the pen only if he shoves himself through the small bars. He has the panic attacks whenever he hears a strange noise, so I think there have been two in the past month. He hit his face each time. He's usually very happy; he'll do HUGE binkies, run as fast as he can all over the apartment, etc. He flops all the time, it's adorable. He shows no signs of stress except when he's nervous. I'm fostering three 4 week old kittens at the moment (they're kept separate from him, but he can hear their meowing sometimes). Ever since we've been housing them, the binkying has lessened and he's definitely more nervous. One of their "meows" triggered a panic attack of his. It's a small apartment but I have them as far away from each other as possible. He has mini panic attacks every day now, where he thumps several times per second and runs and hides somewhere.

My boyfriend and I have discussed getting a second rabbit. It sounds like a good idea, but we fear that Bean will be terrified of the other rabbit like he's terrified of a kitten we have. The last thing we want to do is cause any more panic attacks.

You need to get him neutered before you do anything.

If it's just 2x a month I don't think it's that bad. Rabbits are tough if he hits his face a couple times here and there he will live. He just needs to get use to the abnormal sounds. I think if you neuter him and just give him time he will settle down and the panic attacks will lessen.

If you do decide to get a bunwife make sure you do your research on how to bond them. This is Very tricky and can be a long process. You will need a completely different cage and living space for the second rabbit. Please do your research on the process of bonding rabbits before buying a second rabbit.

The absolute worst thing you can do is just get a second rabbit and throw her in with your rabbit.

First off, get your rabbit neutered.

This could possibly solve half of the issues that you are currently having with him. It's possible that some of his destructive behavior is being driven by hormonal frustration, and neutering could at least calm him down some.

Next, rabbit proof. If your rabbit can destroy anything in his area that you don't want him to, then it isn't really rabbit proofed. This means that anything in the area where you want to keep him, needs to be impervious to him being able to destroy it if you don't want him to. If he's in a pen, that means flooring that can't be destroyed. Sometimes a sheet of lino will work, with all edges outside of the pen so they can't be chewed. But some really determined rabbits can manage to destroy lino. If your bun is like this, then you would have to use hard flooring such as ceramic/stone tile, concrete, or horse stall matting.

You will need to escape proof his pen. Best way is with welded mesh wire with 1/2-1 inch spacing. I prefer the 1/2 inch so they can't chew or pull at the wire. If you need to make any cuts in the mesh, make sure to use flush cut pliers or other cutting tool that can make a flush cut of the wire, so you don't end up with sharp nubs at the cut. And believe me, they are sharp! I also like the vinyl coated mesh the best, as the cut edges don't seem as bad with it.

If there are bare walls in his area that he can get to and chew, then you will need rabbit proof wall coverings, which would be sheets of plastic. There is a vinyl wall panel like this that might work. http://www.lowes.com/pd/Sequentia-4..._clickID=37941310-fbc9-4584-a146-9a11af627dfa
Or clear acrylic sheets, like that used in windows. Just something that little bunny teeth can't get a hold of to rip or chew.

Next is solving his issue with being scared, freaking out, and injuring himself. I would suggest to stop fostering the kittens. It is obviously frightening your rabbit and he could end up with a serious injury as a result. Cats are predators, so it's not unusual for a rabbit to be terrified of them, even to the point of it causing cardiac arrest. And I have to disagree with the above comment. No, rabbits are not tough. If he keeps freaking out and running into the sides of his pen, you risk serious injury to him. Things like a fractured jaw, head injury, or spinal injury. I know of rabbits that it's happened to. Some have had to be pts, some have needed an expensive surgery to wire their jaw back in place. So trying to prevent this from occurring is essential.

I would also add a bunch of hidey holes and tunnels to his area, so that if he does get frightened by something, he has somewhere handy to bolt to instead of into the sides of his pen where he could get injured. You can use something as simple as cardboard boxes. I would give him several and cut both an entrance and exit hole in the box, as rabbits prefer this so they don't feel trapped or cornered. I would especially put them along the edges of his pen, lining the edges as much as possible so that instead of running into the pen when frightened, he has a tunnel or hidey hole to run to.

After you get him neutered keep in mind that it can take 4-8 weeks for the hormones to completely fade, so don't expect any immediate changes right after his neuter. Then after 8 weeks if you still are considering finding a friend for him, read up on bonding rabbits as it can be very complicated and isn't always successful(in which case you could be left with 2 single rabbits). Then find some rescues/shelters in your area that spay/neuter their rabbits and allow you to bring your rabbit on a 'date' to see if there are any potential friends that he might get along with. Not all rabbits like each other, so you want to be able to find one he might like before actually bringing the rabbit home for bonding.

Jbun
Health and Wellness Moderator

beanbupslife said:

My boyfriend and I have discussed getting a second rabbit. It sounds like a good idea, but we fear that Bean will be terrified of the other rabbit like he's terrified of a kitten we have. The last thing we want to do is cause any more panic attacks.

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If you get a second one, make sure both of them are altered. Most shelters and rescues have pre-neutered rabbits for adoption at an affordable price. Opposite sex pairings tend to work the best. There's lots of good info on this board about bonding rabbits.

My newest rabbit is frustrating me a bit as well. He's a Giant Chinchilla and they're supposed to be very friendly. His breeder swore that he was a big suck but he has turned out to be really shy and will not let me pet him, even after a few weeks. I have a Flemish girl who really is a big suck, and it's sad to see the difference between the two. I bought him to bond with her once they're both fixed. Hopefully he'll improve once he's neutered and with her.

I hope things work out with Bean and he settles down for you. He's a cute little rabbit!