Colony made from an old above ground pool.....

My son is almost done with school for the year. He has been here on the weekends and seen my colony for the rabbits that I converted from my old open air chicken coop. Mine does have a roof and is dry. We have an old above ground pool that is about 35 ft in diameter. Lots of space (about 950 feet) with the 5 ft walls still intact - can you see where I am going with this? My son wants to (and has already started) converting this area to a rabbit colony. The liner has been removed since it was damaged a few years ago and useless. There is about 2 feet of nice sand underneath and a retaining wall is another 2 feet of rock and gravel 2 feet out from that - not too worried about digging with that wall filled with gravel and large rock all the way around. He has also placed several dog carrier type nest boxes/burrows in the set up he partially buried them in the sand to make them nice and homey. They should stay pretty cool this summer. I am most concerned about shade and keeping the rain off of them - I know they will go into the burrows, but think they need a bit more. We have transplanted a few small shrubs also, and they seem to be doing fine, not drooping. I suggested to him that he make some kind of lean to to keep feed dry also, we are working on that. Is there anything I am forgetting? I am paranoid I guess because my colony is outside, yet still provides a roof and some protection from the weather.

You might want bird netting over the top to keep hawks and owls out. Do you have raccoons? They can be a real problem too if the colony does not have a secure roof. Is it coyote proof?

Do you still have the pool liner? Even damaged it might be able to be used to keep rain off a section of the pool colony.

The pool liner is long gone. It was ripped in too many places and ended up being removed in sections. We do plan to make an area for feed (pellets always available and in the winter hay/straw) that will have sheet metal roof and place that in the center. We have been piling brush in there also to deter hawks - especially around the burrow entrances. Here are some pics from about 2 weeks ago - we have done more since then, but it will give you an idea of what we are working with. We have also seeded the area with some grass and other seeds like millet - it already has some stuff growing like dandelion, clover, grass, wildflowers, yarrow, etc. But not much alfalfa - we are going to pick up some seed this week. Hopefully with only a few rabbits it won't need much supplementing with cut greens......we'll see. We are trying to develop a layer of topsoil over the sand by adding already composted stuff too - that is going slowly of course.

35' diameter yields 97sq ft of space. This will not maintain any type of forage even with just a pair and their offspring with the offspring being butchered/sold regularly before they manage to breed.

I thought the area of a circle is = to pi X's the radius squared? Since the diameter is 35 feet then the radius is 17.5 This would be 3.14 X (17.5 X 17.5) I am getting about 960 sq feet of area......

well, those calculations sound good to me, but the picture with nothing for size comparison seems less than that ...like, I want to say, you're sure that isn't 15 feet across that pool?

That looks like one mighty big shovel....

No, I am quite sure that I measured correctly. In the pics of the inside of the pool the dog crates that are making up the main burrows are the extra large ones made of hard plastic; the holes we dug for those were about 5 feet long and 3 feet across to make sure that they fit into it well - they were not the dog crates for small dogs. I would really appreciate any suggestions for improvements though if anyone has anymore like Maggie. I worry that I will fail to think of something crucial and we might lose rabbits because of my silly oversight. The last thing I want is to make a bunny paradise only to have a smart predator grab them or lose bunnies from an escape.

Ok, I was picturing those as small dog crates, sorry. I would second Maggie's suggestions about predator proofing, I would be thinking about raccoons and dogs and cats in my area, as well as hawks, others have mentioned weasels and rats, but in your set-up I can't see a good way to "fence" those out, the sheer wall may work or they may dig/climb in somehow.

I think some kind of brush may help to give the rabbits a feeling of cover and security. However, if the floor of that is as sandy and packed as you mentioned, you wont be able to grow much in it that will survive the rabbits attentions. What about some small potted trees in large pots with hardware cloth around the trunk and over the top of the pot?

What about rain? How is the drainage there? If it is sandy all the way down, great, but if you have a layer of clay I would be worrying about drowned kits...also drill lots of drainage holes in the bottoms of the dog crates or something...kits defecate in the burrow, and rain may get in. Most nest boxes rely on humans to clean them, in nature, the rabbit just makes another burrow. However sand needs the support that your dog crates offer...You are on the right track there I think, but just may need to make some adjustments. If I were you I would want a clean out (and peeking!!) door cut in the top of the crate. Maybe PVC pipe fitting? maybe larger....

I've been having some concerns about the sand. If the rabbits decide to dig burrows instead of using the provided nest sites, will the sand cave in?

I wonder if there are any ideas at this site that might help?
http://ressources.ciheam.org/om/pdf/c08/95605275.pdf

I think Akane just misplaced the decimal in his calc. A = πr2. er...that doesn't show well...A=3.14159*radius(squared). so...3.14159 X 306.25 = 962.112 sq feet.

I'd give them some platforms to hide under and jump up on top of. easy for you to build with just some cement blocks as legs. Or an old table with the legs sawn off to just a foot or 18" high My buns LOVE to jump up on top of stuff AND it gives them yet another spot to get away and increases the square footage.

Looks like a great idea. I second/third the idea of a form of screen or something over the top so predators can't swoop in.