Our female rabbit has just started to attack me, but not my husband

[SuzanneW]

For about a couple of week's now, our rabbit, sixpense attacks me when I give her food. I have to now wear gloves. this does not happen to my husband.

We have two rabbits and decided on getting them, that we wanted two females, since we have had the hassle of littles ones before ( at first, lovely and yes so very, very cute, but oh wow, it happened so often, we were being overrun lol). Anyway because of this, we decided on only girls!

Well, all I can say is either, the other one is gay or we have been duped - since I caught Her/him doing naughties!!!

And not so soon after this, our definate female, starts trying to bite me!

Could she be pregnant? I have noticed just today that her back looks as though she has been sort of tugging at it! Also, she does seem to be heavier on either side of her body and very carefully, I tried to pick her up, so that I could clean their cage and she - well all I can say, seemed to be in pain and shaking, so I had to leave her!!!

I do stress, that is is very new, as a while back, although she did not like me picking her up, she did settle into me, and absolutely no sign of attack!

Is this behavour pattern from a pregnant rabbit?

Suzanne

 

[Bunnylady]

You didn't say what age your rabbits were when you got them. With very young rabbits, even very experienced breeders can make mistakes (we joke about getting visited by the "sex change fairy", lol). Once rabbits are about, say, 3 months old, it is much easier to tell if they are male or female. By the time they are old enough to breed (about 6 months), it's pretty hard to get it wrong!

A rabbit of either gender may get possessive about its space and get cranky when you put your hands in its cage, though this is more common with does. A doe that normally is tolerant about being handled may become a touch-me-not when she is pregnant, so yes, this behavior could mean that your doe is expecting. On the other hand, rabbits can experience false pregnancies. As is the case with many kinds of animals, mounting is a type of dominance display, and higher ranking females will do it, too. A rabbit doe can have a false pregnancy in response to being mounted, even if the other animal was female. So it's a bit hard to say just what your doe's behavior really means. I'd take the rabbit you aren't sure of and turn it over. If he(?) is old enough to be fathering litters, you should be able to see visible "boy parts" on him. That should at least give you a better idea as to whether your doe could really be expecting or not.

 

[SuzanneW]

Thanks for that.

Not sure how old she is, but she is by no means a baby. And to be honest, we are rather reluctant to see if Tuppense is a male as they do not react very well when we tried before to check our other ones.

I am hoping it is because she is pregnant as it is no fun trying to feed them, when she wants to take my finger off!

I really don't think it is a territory thing, because again - she has had no trouble with me picking her up or at least, she didn't want it but did not try to attack me!

Anyway, again many thanks for your informative response