Building a Rabbit Hutch
We recently took in a friend's farm rabbit. He'd been living in a barn alongside donkeys and was chewing on the donkey's legs, so he had to go. He may eventually live in our barn/garage, but that's still just a frost wall at this point. For now, we chose to co-house him with our birds.
We have two coops - a 4x8 + nesting boxes goose coop and a 8x8 chicken coop. Both have water, power, fiber, and wireless internet courtesy of a trench I dug through the back yard a few years ago. Since then, I've added exterior and interior lighting, smart switches, automatic doors, cameras, trim, and gutters. Initially, we considered walling off a nesting box or two in the goose coop and making a small opening only he could go in - this presented a couple of issues. The geese can be territorial and the nesting boxes would be a PITA to routinely clean. Ultimately, we decided to build a raised hutch in the larger coop.
I picked up some 2x2 and 2x3 lumber from home depot and built a small 32"x18" box. I used some screws and washers to affix 1/2" hardware cloth all the way around. From what I've read, ventilation is extremely important with rabbits as their respiratory systems are sensitive and they don't tolerate heat very well (not much of an issue in the winter, but he'll likely spend at least one summer out here). On the respiratory front, rabbits also don't tolerate non-kiln-dried pine shavings very well. As the shavings off-gas, the phenols released can cause liver damage. In the large coop, we've been using primarily sand as flooring, with some pine shavings for nesting boxes. We'll likely swap this out for another material, as the pine shavings we've been buying from tractor supply are not guaranteed to be kiln dried.
We used some long structural screws to tie the hutch directly into two studs a couple of feet off the ground. I cut a basic OSB base for now but will likely swap out for some 14GA rabbit wire from Klubertanz soon. The consensus is split on wire bottomed rabbit cages - I've read lots of people using it on large scale rabbit farms without issue and others claiming it will tear up paws. In either case, you need relatively fine 14GA mesh (vinyl coated seems even better) which I couldn't procure locally, hence the short term OSB base. The advantage of a wire base is all of the rabbit waste will fall out and the chickens will take care of the rest - all but self cleaning. We're going to give it a shot and keep an eye on his paws - we can always swap back to a solid base.
We filled the box with hay and left the rabbit a few days to acclimate. It's been extremely cold out the past few weeks and fresh water nearly immediately freezes. To deal with this, we bought a Farm Innovators heated rabbit water bottle. This unit is designed to hang right on cage wire and holds a couple days worth of water. It has an extremely short (maybe 18") power cord, so I had to add an additional outlet near the rabbit hutch. We also added a grain and hay feeder.
Yesterday, I got around to finishing the rest. Using 2x4, 2x3, and 2x2s, I build a little ledge and an interlocking, hinged base + ramp. The ledge is a 2x4 with a 2x3 spiked on the front in an "L" shape. I used 2x2s and scrap T1-11 to construct the ramp. The top has a key way that matches the ledge. It securely rests on the ledge but is easy to remove for cleaning the coop. I wrapped the ramp in fake grass we had hanging around from an old project.
The landing sits flush with the doorway of the hutch. The hinge ensures the ramp can change height as the coop base material changes depth throughout the year.
We cut the door opening in front of the ramp last night after the coop door was closed. Doesn't look like he has ventured out beyond the ramp landing yet.
