Rabbit Web Discussion Board

Our doe, Midnight, is in the house right now and has been since November 1. Once the weather is warm enough, she\'ll head back out to the barn and her hutch. Anyway, she has become quite the house rabbit and enjoys her romps outside of the cage, being petted and even hand fed occasionally. Yesterday she was very aggressive to the bunnies (not hers) that were out to play at the same time. They usually are all out for a few hours every day when my son & I have time to supervise. She didn\'t bite any of them, just sort of pushed them around. Today I went to clean her cage and she lunged at me. She\'s done this before and I just pet her for a few minutes before sending her out to play. Well today she lunged a second time and bit my hand. No broken skin or bleeding, but I was quite shocked. Any reasoning for this behaviour? Same cage, same food, same spot, same routine and not pregnant (hasn\'t been bred since September). Any thought are greatly appeciated.

PS - a picture of Midnight and one of the babies is attached

My female did that to me, once she reached maturity. Her territorial instincts came in real strong, and she would bite me and she did break the skin. I have a scar to prove it! Once I got her spayed, she quite bitting me. She will ocassionally lunge at me if I put my hand in the hutch when she is eating her greens, but for the most part, she is a pretty good rabbit, and no longer the she devil she turned into before she was spayed.

We\'ve never had that with our does (even our mature ones and those with kits). However, we have a couple of bucks that do that...so much so that we\'ve had to put them into a hutch that opens from the top so we can reach down for them instead of toward them where they have the advantage. These bucks used to be the sweetest, cuddliest rabbits too! It is very disappointing to not be able to \"cuddle\" them anymore.