The Great Rabbit Switcheroo

[Miss M]

Today was Rabbitry Cleaning Day, and end of quarantine. Our rabbitry had become a wrecked entity during the time we had all of those accidental litters... we had some sneezers in the litters, and (though we had had plenty of sneezers before) we hastily rearranged the rabbitry to somewhat quarantine the sneezers from the non-sneezers.

With the accidental litters gone, except for one doe we kept back to replace Squeak (while sharing her cage with her), the upheaval was no longer necessary. But then we lost Pharaoh, our buck, to stress because of some dogs. We closed the rabbitry and waited.

Nothing happened, and we brought in some new rabbits, which meant more quarantine. But that's over. It was time to get the rabbitry back together again, and clean it of all the fur that had attached itself everywhere, as well as waste buildup on crossbars and such.

We removed all the rabbits from the rabbitry, sticking them in all sorts of temporary accommodations in the yard (which they happily mowed while we cleaned). We removed all the cages, and power-washed and bleached them before rehanging them where they belonged. We removed the rabbits from the chicken coop, and then their cages got the same treatment, and were hung in the rabbitry with the others.

We clipped a lot of bunny nails as we put the rabbits back into the cages.

We went from:

Empty cage | Squeak/Wave | Empty space empty space empty space | Fluffy | Niyuki | Nefertiti

In the bumpout: Cali buck | Thumper

In the chicken coop: 3 rabbits

To now this arrangement:

Buck | Doe | Cali buck | Thumper | Squeak/Wave | Fluffy | Niyuki | Nefertiti

In the bumpout: Buck


And the rabbitry and chicken coop got a power washing. Oh, yeah, it's way better in there now! The chickens weren't too happy, but they'll get over it.

And... we picked up 15 bags of leaves to put on the floor for the chickens to play in. We'll do that tomorrow.

 

[Homer]

Glad to hear the dog problem is taken care of, hopefully it's permanent.

I went threw the clean up this fall too and it was definitely a busy day. Like you I had rabbits stuffed everywhere I could find to put one. Rabbit tractor with dividers installed, a pair in the fenced garden, one in the garage, screened back porch, bedroom etc. Break out the power washer and the bleach. Set up the fans to dry everything out and reload the straw and hay. Send a few to freezer camp and get them all in their new location. It sure does make it a lot better get all you bunnies in a row.

Feeding time goes a lot faster and clean up is a breeze.

Now get out there and make those chickens happy. :gettowork:

 

[EnglishSpot]

Whew! That is a lot of work! Good for you! The mini-velociraptors will get over having their coop cleaned!

One question--why the buck/doe/buck/doe arrangement? Just curious.

 

[grumpy]

I'm sure you all have seen my set-up from the mountain of pics that I've posted.
I've wondered about using a power washer, myself. But, I'm leery of the
amount of water that's required. All of my cages are more or less permanent.
It would be a complete nightmare trying to remove and replace 80+ holes.

Any ideas...or would the power washer be alright, "IF" I don't go crazy with it.

Not tryin' to hijack your thread Miss M.
Grumpy.

 

[Miss M]

Glad to hear the dog problem is taken care of, hopefully it's permanent.

It's not really taken care of... but our winter visqueen is up, so dogs can't see in, and the rabbits have limited visibility. I'm really hoping that we can put up some fencing where the dogs usually come from before we take the visqueen down.

That black dog showed up in our backyard the other day, and my husband went after it. He yelled "Get off my land!" in a growly, aggressive voice at the top of his lungs several times, hoping that the owner would hear. He did. My husband heard a worried "Get back over here!" from off in the distance. Maybe he'll keep better track of his dog, after hearing it being yelled at like that.

Like you I had rabbits stuffed everywhere I could find to put one.

:lol: Yeah, we had a long piece of fencing that we curled like a pretzel to make three sections. We had a rabbit in a small kennel. We had Niyuki and her litter of seven 8-week-olds in the big dog trap we built. Another small fence section made an area for another rabbit.

It was fun getting all those babies out of that trap! :roll:

Feeding time goes a lot faster and clean up is a breeze.

YES.

mini-velociraptors

:lol: They are, aren't they?

One question--why the buck/doe/buck/doe arrangement? Just curious.

Well, it's like this.

When we originally put this together, it was growout | buck | growout | Thumper. We figured this would help keep spraying issues down, not having a buck next to another buck, or next to a doe. Thumper was next to a doe, but he's a very laid-back buck.

Now, we have bucks in the growout cages. They are 6" smaller than the doe cages, which is why we gave them to the bucks.

Clear as mud?

Not tryin' to hijack your thread Miss M.

Nah, you're fine.

I've wondered about using a power washer, myself. But, I'm leery of the
amount of water that's required. All of my cages are more or less permanent.
It would be a complete nightmare trying to remove and replace 80+ holes.

Any ideas...or would the power washer be alright, "IF" I don't go crazy with it.

I think it would depend on how well you could get the water back out of the building, and how quickly you could dry it in there.

My husband says that he didn't use the power washer on full power except on the bottoms of the walls, where the salts and calcium had collected from urine. Most of the time, he wasn't actually using a lot of water. What is going to move (except for on the lower part of the walls, where the urine buildup is) is going to move quickly. Shay says about 60% of the fluff moved with the water. Much of the rest of it dropped from the ceiling and rafters to the floor. After he was finished, he raked off the top layer of hay from the floor, which had caught the fur and stuff, and removed it from the rabbitry.

Shay thinks you could try spreading drop cloths over your cages, and see how your rabbits take the sound of the pressure washer. Ours didn't really seem to care too much, but ours is electric... not as noisy (or as powerful) as a gas-powered one. It certainly made its share of racket, though. It was the chickens that seemed to mind it. I think they felt like it was chasing them, even though we made sure they were on the other side of the wall from it. :lol:

 

[JenerationX]

That's a LOT of cleaning. You all have this multiple rabbit thing figured out so well... and I've been looking at NIC and dog kennel options for a few weeks and can't decide what I'd want to do for just a single bunny. LOL

 

[Zass]

That's a LOT of cleaning. You all have this multiple rabbit thing figured out so well... and I've been looking at NIC and dog kennel options for a few weeks and can't decide what I'd want to do for just a single bunny. LOL

So far, my favorite type of inside cage is more of a fenced exercise pen with a litterbox. If your rabbit is not a climber, you can get away with an open top pen like I have for Mucky. It's really nice for everyone to be able to reach down and pet her without having to open a cage.
She likes it too, and frequently stands with her paws on the closest side to us begging for treats or petting.
A nice touch is having 4 inches of mess guard on the bottom to contain hay, bedding and everything else rabbits manage scatter. It still needs swept daily, and the litter changed every few days. Bucks can spray, so...that would need to be taken into consideration if you wanted to own a house buck...

Big doors that allow you to reach and clean every corner are probably the most important thing. Rabbits in general really hate being pulled through small openings. I fear the tiny side doors on some pet shop cages might be part of the behavior problems so common in pet bunnies.
Mine have appreciated being lifted up and out of a pen more than they ever liked being pulled out of any cage door.

 

[JenerationX]

I like the idea of the open top pen... but not sure what I'd do about the floor. The only room I'd be able to get away with housing a bun has thick berber carpet, so I'd have to come up with some kind of base that could be easily cleaned.

 

[Miss M]

That's a LOT of cleaning. You all have this multiple rabbit thing figured out so well... and I've been looking at NIC and dog kennel options for a few weeks and can't decide what I'd want to do for just a single bunny. LOL

Oh, you should have seen me agonize over what kind of rabbitry we were going to have! :lol:

 

[JenerationX]

Oh, you should have seen me agonize over what kind of rabbitry we were going to have! :lol:

I can imagine. :?

With caged rabbits... how often and for how long do they get out of the cage and how do you manage that?

 

[EnglishSpot]

Hahahaha! Jeneration, I love how you assume you will have A bunny. Nine months ago I had no bunnies and my daughter was begging for one. Today, I have two. And potential plans for popples this spring!! Perhaps get a bonded pair, siblings? It's like the Pringles commercials--you can't have just one. If you do get just one, please plan NOW for the potential for TWO. Because two rabbits isn't that much harder to take care of than one. A bale of hay and straw (or partial bales) go a loooong way. If you have horse owner friends, perhaps you can get partial bales from them.

Anyway, plan for one, but make space now in the planning stages for two.

(And I've got to figure out where my growout cage would be....)

 

[JenerationX]

It's a big step in this house to assume I'll have any at all. If I were completely on my own and could afford it, I'd have a dog, a cat, a reef aquarium, and a couple bunnies. *sigh* Mom and I are splitting the bills right now which helps us both out... and I don't want to have anything she's not comfortable with. I'm still working her slowly up to one small(ish) animal. I'm ok with a large crate and penning off half my living room area if I can figure out an easy to clean flooring.

 

[EnglishSpot]

I saw on FB where someone had gotten a a small plastic kiddy pool, surrounded it with a yard pen (the type for puppies) and kept their guinea pigs in there. They had shavings on the floor and things for amusement. Easy to clean, just rinse the pool in the shower. Get the extra small pool from Walmart when summer stuff comes out (after Valentine's Day). Have a small pet carrier handy for when you need to stash the bunny safely (I found mine in the garbage this summer--cleaned it up, good as new). I'll see if I can find the picture and post it.

 

[JenerationX]

That's great for small buns!

I'm looking at these too: http://www.tractorsupply.com/en/store/r ... -ft-x-6-ft

Put something up the sides to contain the mess a bit...

 

[Miss M]

Oh, you should have seen me agonize over what kind of rabbitry we were going to have! :lol:

I can imagine. :?

With caged rabbits... how often and for how long do they get out of the cage and how do you manage that?

Not as often as I would like. When we do, we just take a long section of fencing and clip the ends together to make a temporary pen. It's very easily stored and moved. We even moved it with rabbits in it, by lifting it just above the ground and bumping the rabbits with it to get them to move. They had mown the grass down where they were.

 

[EnglishSpot]

I would think that the digging aspect would wreck the pad, plus you still have the sides for the spray. If you litter box train your bunny (which mine has taken less than a week to litter box train) you won't have to worry about too much spray. On the upside, the kiddie pool would offer automatic 'urine guard' and you could layer some inches in bedding for when they desire to dig. Like Miss M says when you want to take them outside to dine and exercise, you can always remove the wire circling the pool and take them outside for breezes and grass. Truly a two in one system, now that I think about it. Heck, you might be able to set that up in your bedroom if it is big enough!

 

[JenerationX]

Yeah.. I haven't been exposed to the chewing and digging habits of rabbits yet. LOL

I don't know that there'd be anything fun to dig on that. It's a big solid sheet with no edges and they're pretty thick. Do buns dig at everything or mostly textured stuff? I know the berber carpet would definitely be toast. I thought flat stuff would be safe.

Definitely nothing else fitting in my bedroom... at least nothing bigger than maybe 2X3 and that'd be a little cramped.

I'm trying to get over the vision of a brightly colored round kiddie pool in the family room. Can't they make a neutral colored rectangular pool?? :lol: I can picture the kiddie pool out on the deck in nice weather for sure though. Not to mention it would be really easy to dump and hose down. It might grow on me.

 

[EnglishSpot]

The only digging I've run into is when it was hot and Lexi wanted to cool off in the sunflower bed next to the foundation, that's about it. They dig fast, so if you're outside, keep an eye peeled on them. Chewing goes hand in hand with rabbits. Lexi has a wooden house to chew while in her hutch but I also provide hay. However, there are some bites taken out of the deck railing (don't let my husband know) and she's gnawed one leg of the hutch itself pretty good. I don't know if it tastes better than the other 3!!! I have a willow bush and something else in my yard, so she gets to chew on those too.

Rabbits are versatile and they don't know the difference between living inside, outside, in a hutch or in a swimming pool. Your rabbit will do just fine when you get it. I just finished reading 'A House Rabbit Primer' by Lucile C. Moore and it has good tips if you're going for mobile indoor bunny. Facebook has a page called 'Housing Ideas for Rabbits and GunieaPigs, Even if you eat them' and it's been neat seeing the many different ways people house their rabbits and cavies.

I've also seen where people have repurposed a dresser or cabinet into a hutch. It'd take a little work and wire but that's an option too. I'm in the process of converting a bathroom cabinet into a 'house' I can attach to the hutch so Lexi can get out of the cold and snow entirely if she decides.

 

[JenerationX]

My dog did that with a table leg. He never touched any of the other legs or the chairs, but he'd go hide under the table and chew that damn leg to bits. I never understood why the rest weren't delicious too.

I've looked at a couple sites that had great pictures of NIC cages, one dresser someone refinished etc, etc. TONS of options out there. I want to make sure there's enough space to be comfortable even on days when there's only a few hours of floor time... but if possible have something that doesn't look too out of place in the room. I like the X-pens because they look a little more well put together than I'd manage with NIC panels, I can change shape at any time without a ton of work, and I think the room will look more open without a closed top.