Cage size?

[Nyctra]

For single adult New Zealands and Californians, are 24"x30" cages really okay? They look too small IMO, but I hear they're fine?

 

[MamaSheepdog]

I raise standard Rex which are a bit smaller than NZ's and Cals, and my doe cages are 24" x 30", bucks are 24" x 24". They are doing fine- but I wish the cages were larger, especially for the does.

 

[OneAcreFarm]

I have both of those breeds and I use 30" x 36" for breeding does and 30" x 30" for open does, bucks and growouts.

 

[skysthelimit]

if you try to get them out as often as possible, it's not too bad.

 

[akane]

Personally I find it a bit small and only use 24x24 cages for breeds like mini rex and dutch or smaller. For my meat breeds I have 36x30", 48x30", and 48x24" cages.

 

[MaggieJ]

I would never use such small cages for standard rabbits.

 

[skysthelimit]

Personally I find it a bit small and only use 24x24 cages for breeds like mini rex and dutch or smaller. For my meat breeds I have 36x30", 48x30", and 48x24" cages.

The 48 sounds interesting, but I have a hard enough time getting at the rabbit in the 30x36 cages, especially on the second tier. Do you have two doors on it?

 

[akane]

The entire front of my cages is a door. The top ones all swing down and the bottom row where there is one swings up 180 degrees.

 

[Nyctra]

Oh good, it's not just me! I really dislike this 24"x30" size - I'm wary of even using the double quonset(sp?) I'd built for my much smaller pet rabbits... :/

 

[skysthelimit]

The entire front of my cages is a door. The top ones all swing down and the bottom row where there is one swings up 180 degrees.

Aha. There would not be enough clearance in the barn if I did that. My doors are 12x12, just big enough to fit nest boxes, except two i cut too small. Where do you put the bottles and feeders? I cut the doors small to give me plenty of room for bottles and feeders.

 

[toastedoat37]

24x30 is fine for adult new zealands and californians,,,,,,,you could even go 24x24 if you had to but a doe with little ones would need at least 6 sq feet 24x36 or 30x30.

If you have outdoor hutches in a yard thats not fenced, i personaly think that you can have too big of hutches ,a rabbit can get moving faster in bigger spaces and hurt themselves when they get frightened by preditors(neighbor dogs).

 

[Nyctra]

Neighbor dogs aren't an issue - it's bears I'm worried about. Soon the rabbits will be in a building so the bears won't see them and they won't see the bears. So far the bears don't want to bother anything they can't see, and I hope it stays that way. If it don't, I got a big gun.

 

[grumpy]

Standard doe-cage is 30"X30". Grow-out pens are 36"X30". Buck cages are 24"X30". Standard height is 18".

I've used this size cages for meat rabbits, NZW's & Cals, since the mid-70's with no problems what so ever.

Could the doe cages be bigger? Yeah...a little-bit. But, my short arms have enough trouble reaching a hunched up doe in the back of a 30x30.

Grumpy.

 

[toastedoat37]

seems to be an lot of bears in oregon and washington the last few years

 

[Nyctra]

Baiting and use of dogs is illegal in OR - don't know how long it's been that way. Me and dad both tried to get a bear two years in a row, but conveniently they only come around in the middle of the night, when it's illegal to shoot.

 

[akane]

My cages are stacked on a pvc stand with exactly 1 bottle width gap so I just alternate them for the center cages. Each section is 36 or 48" with the option of a divider to make 24x24" cages which would have 1 door for both. With the size of cage we put hay silos and pellet or grain feeders on the inside now. It keeps things neater anyway. All spilled food ends up in the area within the pvc framed base where it is scraped out with a flat ended shovel. There's no holes to cut in the wire either and I can change my mind as many times as I want.