2 Bonded bunnies

I'm so happy to announce that Bennett and Ella have taken the final bonding step, they are now living together in one space! The whole room is now undivided, no longer to two bunnies exist side by side in pens, there is one pen, one whole room that is now their kingdom (hopefully this kingdom will be extended eventually). Yay for bonded bunnies! It is so much easier to hang out and take care of them, without trying to hop the fence that used to be down the middle of the room! They both did really well, we took out the divider yesterday morning and Laurie did work in there on her computer all day to observe their behavior in the new space. She reported that she saw cuddling and grooming (even Ella grooming Bennett!) and no fighting. So, we took the plunge and let them spend the night together. As far as I can tell, there was no bunny butt hair pulling and no obvious wounds from any fighting. They are definitely a happy couple, it's very cute.

There are a few hiccups, of course, with this new arrangement. The biggest is feeding times. Bennett will wolf up anything that he sees as food and when he's done with his pellets, he moves right on to hers. While Ella is more of an all day snacker on pellets, but I can't leave her food down for her, because Bennett would definitely make it his second or third breakfast. So, this morning for breakfast time, I put Bennett in the large carrier with his pellets and let Ella snack on hers out in the room, with no pressure from him. When he finished, I put hers up so he couldn't feast on them. I'm hoping that she'll learn to eat when she gets the chance of Bennett being in the carrier and until she really catches on, she can keep her tummy happy with hay. Last night, when I fed them their salads, neither seemed really concerned when the other hopped up and started eating at his or her plate. Most of the time, the other would switch plates and a play ring around the salad dishes of sorts. I'm pretty sure that they each got enough greens to satisfy them (although I know Bennett would interject here and say that he always needs more food, he's never satisfied). Ella is a vacuum cleaner when it comes to greens, which is really funny to watch, it's like she doesn't chew at all, where Bennett takes a long time chewing it all.

In other good news, Ella has learned to drink her water from the water bottles. She watched Bennett do it enough times that she finally got the hang of it. Sometimes, though, she gets frustrated with it and tries to bite the end off of the drinking end (which is metal) and gets a funny look on her face, like "why isn't this working!".

This morning, Laurie and I worked on getting some of Ella's marking spots off of the carpet. Boy did she get mad at us for doing it. Those spots where hers and nobody better touch them. Midway through the cleaning, she walked right up to me and lifted her tail and marked, just to make a point. Sadly for her, we cleaned that one up, too. Yes, Ella, we know the whole room belongs to you, enough with the marking already!

Our yard is full of weeds in the back, and I'm hoping that some of them are dandelions, because dandelions are very good bunny treats. I'm going to see if I can collect some of the seeds when they ripen and grow some in the house for good bunnies. We'll see if I can :). We got some dried pineapple from Trader Joe's on Friday and it's pretty much bunny crack for both bunnies (even Ella, who doesn't really do the sweet thing), even more coveted than the dried apple O's. We're really lucky to have TJ's so close, because all their dried fruit is sugar and sulfide free.

Well, I'm hungry, so I'm going to go see what's for lunch, just wanted to share the happy bonding news!