Buy or Build The Right Kind Of Cages

If you keep your rabbits outdoors, locate their hutches in a protected site. The hutch should have a roof with a generous overhang to help protect the animals from inclement weather and adequate flooring to protect their feet.

Unless you have puh-lenty of time and patience, make sure that your rabbit cages are kept off the ground and have wire floors and sides. I'm speaking from experience, because—if we kept them on the ground in a hutch that had a solid wood floor . . . that cage had to be emptied of manure every day, or else the inhabitants would get sick.

An elevated cage, made of sturdy welded wire, lets any "bunny buttons" pass right through the bottom to a tray (or the ground) underneath, so you don't need to clean the droppings nearly as often. Besides, emptying a tray—or even shoveling a pile out from under a cage—is one heckuva lot easier than getting down on your hands and knees to clean out a hutch with a small wooden trowel.

Your rabbits' cages should measure 16" long, 30" wide, and 32" high. If you raise giant bunnies, though (12 pounds and over), their cages should be about 18" X 30" X 48" . Use store-bought boards for the framing, not scrap, because ear mites and lice sometimes inhabit secondhand lumber. And give all the wooden parts a good coat of waterproof stain.

When you move your "little people of the forest" into their new homes, put a good-sized board in each pen. The animals will be able to sit comfortably on the planks and give their feet a rest from the wire floor.

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