Illinois/Wisconsin people - biodiverse building

[Cottie]

What kind of building are your bunnies in?

We're doing some *ahem* "reorganizing", so the rabbits and the chickens are moving out of the garage and into the actual chicken coop. This is very sad, since the coop is ALL THE WAY on the other side of the property. :x

Anyway, it's old and it's not insulated. We're going to replace half the windows with double-pane glass and close the rest up entirely. At the time of writing, the plan (always subject to change) is 24" x 30" x 24" cages for each individual rabbit, and a few 24" x 48" x 24" grow-out cages. These will be hung on the walls, inside, to increase the ambient temperature for the chickens. 3 ducks, 23 chickens (unless I get those silkies I want, then 30 chickens), and 3 pigs. Yes, it's a large building.

The rabbits will tolerate the cold extremes we get, yes? They won't freeze to death?

Will their ambient body heat, combined with that from the pigs, keep the coop warm enough that the chickens don't freeze?

I was considering building outdoor hutches, and placing the rabbits on the wind-blocked (north east facing) side. However, that would remove their usefulness as miniature heaters within the building.

 

[Homestead Hope]

I live in the upper peninsula of Michigan about 5-6hrs above you. Just moved up here from Kenosha, wi actually, a few months ago and I had similar questions about the rabbits and chickens.

The main concern with the outbuilding should be to make sure there aren't any draft blowing on the animals. That's going to be the #1 thing that effects them and cause illness that may lead to death.

The chickens inside an unheated building should be fine, if your worried about the temp just keep an eye on frostbite on the combs and whatnot, otherwise they aren't going to "freeze to death". Give the straw and they will be just fine.

Same with the rabbits, you have to worry about the water bottles freezing before the actual rabbit. People I've seen up here keep their rabbits in wire cages all winter long, even when the snow reaches almost as high as the rabbit! With some straw and a heated water bottle they don't even care. So inside should be just fine.

Drafts and freezing water are the real concerns.

 

[Random Rabbit]

Our rabbits are housed in an unheated building. DH worked very hard to make certain that there were no drafts ( or leaks). The rabbits do fine thru the winter. The only thing we changed for our Palomino rabbits is we use water crocks instead of bottles. We have more than double the number of crocks to rabbits... so we can bring in the frozen ones and replace with fresh. Surprisingly since the renovation... the days of completely frozen crocks was far fewer than previous years.

We do have DH's workshop that in winter i will move does due to kindle in there and they stay there until the kits are about 3 weeks old. The shop stays at about 40 degrees with minimum heat.

We used to have outside hutches with attached wire runs...Even on the coldest days... the rabbits would be out in the runs..bouncing around... as we mere humans were hurrying trying to avoid freezing out there ! :lol: