re: bonded rabbits fighting

Question
On November 11 we decided to get a mate for our rabbit, we took a 6 month old white cotton tail rabbit. The first several days it was tough since Lola our female rabbit is very territorial, Milo our new rabbit is very passive. We tried bonding them by placing them in small laundry basket and in several days they advance to the tub, then after about a week they spend their time together in a pen with very little nipping no fighting. Their pen is divided by about a 3 feet tall wood divider. We have to put a sheet over one of the pen so that they can jumped over and fight. That night Milo jumped over the sheet which is the first time occurence usually it was Lola who like to do that.
We decided to try them out together and took the divider away. They did great and got along well up until this morning. When my husband heard them fighting and separated them. They calmed down then around noontime they had it again and they have lots of hair pulling involved and Milo had a little wound on top of his head and scratch on his left eye. Not so sure what happened except for I changed there box where they sleeping in and threw the old ones out and just place one box, they use to have two and i have a Christmas light place by the window where they at.
Now they are still in the same pen but Milo ids guarded and Lola continuously try to chase him and not so sure if Lola wanted to hurt him or not. But Milo makes sound everytime Lola chase him. Not sure what to do we place them again in the laundry basket and Milo started grooming Lola and Lola just put her head down. Then we place them back in the pen and Lola still do the same ritual trying to chase Milo and Milo makes the noise. I hope you can help us.
Thank you,
Rina

Answer
Hi,

sounds like Lola is the dominant rabbit in this pair.

If he has a scratch on the left eye you need to get to your regular rabbit vet so that the eye does not get infected.  He will need some antibiotic eye drops to prevent infection.  Do not regard this as minor, most wounds on rabbits get infected.  Get in immediately while it's minor.

Fighting needs to be broken up (ie where injuries are resulting).  However after this the behavior you describe is dominance posturing and that needs to continue.  By his behavior it looks like the two of them are both starting to figure out who's going to be in charge.  The dominant one will chase the submissive one around more often.  That's part of the dominance assertion.

One thing.  Do not try pairing an unfixed rabbit with a fixed rabbit.  There will be too much aggression in the unfixed one and it's not fair to either of them, pairing a supercharged hormonal rabbit against a reduced-hormone rabbit.  

If you need to find a good rabbit vet (not all are) go here:

www.rabbit.org/vets/vets.html