Mini Colonies in cages

[velacreations]

I've had a colony going for about 5 years, now. I keep all my does together, then wean kits at six weeks, and weaned kits are in a colony until they are butcher size (usually 12 weeks). I have 2 bucks, and they have their own pens.

I am going to be transitioning to a different system this year. Right now, we have a colony setup with 10-12 does, then 2 bucks we keep separated in their own pens, and then anywhere between 30 to 50 fatteners in their own colony.

We will be changing to a cage/colony mix, I am calling it mini colonies.

Basically, we will have cages attached to underground shelters. Each cage will be about 2 ft by 6 ft, and connected to 3 shelters, each is 2 ft by 2 ft. So, each area will be a total of 24 square feet, and I plan to keep 2-3 does in this space.

The bucks will each have their own cage and shelter, 2x2 for the cage.

The fatteners will be grouped into cages, probably 2 litters to a cage. I am considering giving each group an outdoor run as well.

The reasons we are changing to this is more control over individual does, their feed intake, and better breeding and manure management. I still want to keep the social interaction, especially between the does, and they will all have underground shelters for temperature control and kindling.

Any thoughts on this plan?

 

[Dood]

Sounds good to me.

It is awesome that your girls all get along, when you do the move, I would try and keep littermates together as they will likely have similar feed conversion rates or rabbits with similar traits so a bossy rabbit doesn't hog all the food from a less forceful one.

The only problem i forsee is if you decide a group is not working out and you try to reintroduce one from another pen, or when you need to add replacement does, you could get fighting.

 

[velacreations]

yeah, all of my does get along, so I will try and match up compatible ones with similar habits. That part should be fairly easy. Introducing or switching might be an issue, we will see.