Well my rabbits finally recovered from the heat. We had our first litter, very quickly followed by two more about five weeks ago. We are having problems with our nest boxes though. We have an indoor colony, with matted floors. Currently we have several "half" dog houses, the top and bottom halves separated and upside down, and one dogloo... the husband (against my advice) snuck in there and put traditional nest boxes in each one, I didn't even know they were there until I checked for babies and they were already in use. The does had their kits inside the nest boxes in the "half" shelters, partially buried the next box and then the entire shelter box, and completely sealed up the entrances. The do not seem to like the dogloo, no nests in there. There was no way to get into the big box except to flip the entire thing up, I had babies getting trapped between the nest box and the walls of the big box once they got big enough to crawl out, and once they began moving well they would freak out every time I checked on them and escape out the sides of the big box when you peeked under, or get stuck under the edges, plus I'm doing a bit of damage to mom's hard work every time.... not a good permanent solution. So I'm trying to work out a better way. The small nest boxes need to go, for sure. I'm thinking I need a larger box/shelter with an openable top, so I can see whats going on in there, remove any dead etc, without tearing up the actual nest or having escapes. Logically I would build wooden boxes, but hubby has been offshore for work a ton and I'm not comfortable taking on the construction. I'm debating between large plastic storage boxes, with a hole cut in the front (any ideas how to cut that hole without cracking the plastic or losing a finger?), or maybe large hooded cat litter boxes. The litter boxes would be much more convenient since the are already assembled, no construction necessary, but I'm a bit concerned about the hole for the entrance... every one I have seen is quite high, at least 4-6" off the ground. Do you think I would be getting kits climbing out and not being able to get back in? I have had that problem with traditional next boxes but they were always in a hutch where they were easy to find and put back in... my colony is very large and I'm concerned they may just get lost or hide somewhere where I can't find them and starve. Personally I would be ok with building holes and letting them do their thing but hubby is paranoid about the babies and refuses to just let them be so I need to be able to check on them.

Also how many boxes do you think I need? I have 14 does, a few are still on the younger side (around 6 mos).

Thanks for any suggestions.
Charlotte

A brick placed against the doorway of the covered litter box would help the kits get back in. It acts as a step up for them. I used to use this method when I used traditional nest boxes in cages and it worked great.

I have wooden nest tunnels with hinged lids in my colony. Makes it easy to check on the kits. Maybe go with the minimum number of cat litter boxes for the time being and then add some nest tunnels when hubby is able to build them.

How would the kits know the doorway is there? Kits may still end up lost outside the nest.
You can get cheap rubbermaid tote with a lid at any home store. They are cheap, have lids and you can cut a hole low to the ground for them to get in and out more easily. You can try out different heights of the doors and widths to see which box ends up the best and easiest for them to use.

Sacrifice a cheap soldering iron and melt an opening plus vent holes. A little slow and some hand cramping but no cracking and no risk of bleeding. Plus a nice smooth opening. Downside is the plastic that collects on the soldering iron makes it useless for any future purposes but always useful for gerbil and hamster cages so I sacrificed one and made a custom cat litter box recently.

However rabbits dislike rubbermaid containers and cat boxes in my experience. The colony rabbits will often just plop the offspring in a corner rather than use a plastic tote or box. Mine use the standard wood nest boxes with the half sheltered area and just bury them well in bedding in the winter with no other container to set it in or the large 2x2' cube boxes with a gap that we made. The rest choose to stick them in corners and build a completely free standing nest. I have only had 1 use a plastic box so far. In really cold weather when they bury the boxes well we don't open them up to check kits. We wait until the kits come out because the does will completely block the entrances and one doe will make a 3' mound around a standard nest box. During that cold of weather anything dead gets shoved to the side and frozen so it's not an issue. In warmer weather my does don't block up the entrances or bury the boxes to the top. They just pile along the sides a little.

Thanks!

Mine do seem to prefer the covered box design. We have a few "normal" nest boxes scattered about (they seem to like to sleep in those), the half dog house boxes (four of them), and the huge dogloo..... and all the litters have been in the half dog house boxes, nowhere else. I really thought the dogloo would have been the prime location, because of the tunnel door and shape, but I guess it is too open for them (it is the super giant size for a really big dog, biggest they make), they seem to prefer the covered, dark, smaller boxes. I didn't buy any of the doghouses for this purpose, just used what I had handy trying to set up a lot of options to encourage them to breed, and they chose what they liked. I have heard a lot of people have good results with hay bales to build nests, but mine eat them like candy, definitely no nesting (they do use some of it in the nests they build in the boxes), they get a bale every week or so. That may be because we fed strictly hay and a small amount of whole grain for a while, trying the "no-pellet" thing... so they see them as food. They are back on pellets now but still like their hay.

I did find one newborn kit in the middle of the floor... not sure what happened there, no nest or anything. I just stuck him in one of the other nests with babies and hoped for the best, have not checked on him to see if he made it, that was just yesterday. I'm only check the nests a few times a week.

Spoke to hubby on the phone today and he said we have some sort of tool that will cut the plastic, like a dremel but it vibrates instead of rotating. He may be home tomorrow (with his job you never really know- offshore oil) so hopefully I can make him do it lol.

So any recommendations on number of nests?

You need one nest per pregnant doe, plus other shelters just for hanging out in.

Rabbits like to hide, but they don't like to hide close to their nests. Also, the kits often switch boxes a few days after they first venture out of their home nest box at around 3 weeks old. It's so cute. I come out the next day and the whole litter is cuddled up in a brand new box. So, the more choices they have, the better.

If you control breeding (keep the buck separate), then you will know who's pregnant when, and thus know just how many boxes you need when.

I noticed that... the two litters were born almost a week apart, but once they could hop around they found each other and combined. They go back and forth between the two nests in one large group. Their first instinct is to hide, but after a few minutes will come out and visit. It has been really interesting to watch the developments in social behavior once they had a chance to act normally instead of being confined. The picking order, communication, the way the bucks and does interact....

My bucks are in there full time so I suppose I will just err on the side of too many nests vs. too few. They are a valid part of the rabbit "community" and I do not want to confine them. My older buck is very much in charge of the younger, supervises everything that goes on, and is very outgoing. He always greets me at the door and checks out any changes or additions to the colony (like our new feeder installed yesterday). Quite a character. He has always been a gentleman with the ladies, the main reason I chose him out of the four bucks I had for the colony.

Are the half dog house boxes turned over like a hut or are they set so they are open on top? Just curious...Also, if it was me, I would take out the Dogloo if they are not using it, since it is taking up space that you could use to put a few smaller ones that they are more likely to use.

The half houses are turned over like huts, open on the bottom. They are close to 3ft square and about 1-1/2ft tall. They do really seem to like them, there are often rabbits resting in there, and they also sit on top of them (the flat ones, which are the bottom half, the other half has a roof peak). I was out there yesterday and intended to remove the dogloo, lol, and there are now TWO litters in there. Neither was in the regular nest box inside so we did take that out (put in elsewhere in the colony since they do seem to like resting in them). We also have two new litters in one half house, and one more in another. There is the most beautiful red on white spotted baby... I have one spotted doe (a black and white, we are pretty sure she is 1/2 mini rex and half New Zealand) that my daughter picked out at the feed store- the rest of them are red, black, or white New Zealand... we are breeding for meat but I certainly hope that one survives and is a doe! Just beautiful. The first batch of babies are pretty much weaned... so now I have to decide whether or not to pull them out and put them in a grow out hutch or not. Probably will, considering ease of catching, the ability to feed them out easier, and keeping the colony numbers down, but have to say I'm not looking forward to having to fuss with hutched rabbits again, the colony is just so much less work.