It wasn't complete at the time of this video I did more work to it like finishing up the back wall to protect from the wind. Almost from day one however this setup seemed to give me one problem after the next. For example having a tarp for the roof seemed like a great idea. Light weight and water proof I figured I only needed to raise the center higher then the sides and I would be set. First I hooked the tarp on nails through the eyelets. When wind hit that tarp it didn't take long before the eyelets were no longer hooked. Then I tried using wire to tie down the tarp which held much better... Until the first time it rained. The weight of the water collecting up top tore and pulled enough to show that wasn't working. While fighting with this on a daily basis the watering system showed me just how flawed it was. I rushed the curing time to seal the outlet on the five gallon buckets, big mistake. The buckets never stopped leaking even after I in the end probably applied a full tube of aquarium sealant to each bucket. When I finally got the buckets to almost stop leaking the rabbits chewed through the hose. So fed up with that system I instead switched to water bottles while I continued tweaking the tarp roofing.
Finally after a few weeks of trying I made it so the tarp worked great. It was stretched tight and angled just right so that when it rained at night it barely held any water at all and I could easily pour that off in the morning. In all that tweaking of the tarp I had it very tightly secured to the two by fours you can see in the video.
One night disaster struck my rabbitry. I got a phone call around 4:30 am from one of my neighbors. The man on the phone said he was in his back yard and he hear a loud bang and could see a large animal in with my rabbits! I jumped out of bed (in a very sleepy state) and ran out the door with a baseball bat. Of course not just any baseball bat oh no, this bat was probably about the size of my forearm. I still don't know why we have that thing. Once I got back there I was relieved to see there was no animal but I was dismayed that the tarp roof had finally met its match. Apparently while we slept a very good amount of water had collected on the tarp. So much water that it ended up pulling several of the two by fours off of the four by four posts. I was greeted by the stares of all of the rabbits on the north side of my rabbitry (right side of video) confused, scared, and leaning sideways. I saw a very large amount of water still on the tarp, in the mind set of get the rabbits back upright and fix it properly when you wake up. Still mostly asleep I didn't think twice of using the bat to push up on the tarp to let the water fall off... directly onto my head. Did I mention it was mid January? My girlfriend at this point came wandering outside to see what was going on and was greeted by the sounds of her six foot four boyfriend screeching like a four year old girl. It took her a few days to stop laughing.
Finally I had had it with the home made disaster hutch. I went on craigslist and found someone who was willing to build me a 12 hole rabbit hutch for four hundred dollars. At this point I was so frustrated with my current setup that I sent him the money. Mind you during all this time I hadn't raised a single baby rabbit. My rabbits mated but never once had a litter, more on that later. Now I was a good six to seven hundred in the whole and all I've gotten in return was one meal and higher blood pressure.
The new hutch worked like a charm.... For a few months. Each hole was separated from the next by a sheet of quarter inch plywood. Access to the hutch was done by lifting the hinged roof. Half on one side and half on the other. Soon the rabbits noticed that the plywood divider didn't reach all the way up and they were able to start chewing at it. Eventually allowing them access to the other cages. A few of them were more ambitious and tried to cross over the divider before they had chewed enough of it away. I was welcomed in the morning to see that some had managed to get stuck and hang themselves during the night.
I eventually came up with a brilliant idea. I could put them back in their all wire cages and set them on the grass. Free food for them and no more hanging! Brilliant! Instead of asking online for help I was so determined to rewrite the wheel I didn't bother to see if this was a bad idea. It was. The remaining rabbits got sick and died on me. I was very sad over my failures at this point, with nobody to blame but myself I figured I shouldn't get another rabbit until I've learned a lot more about keeping them.
Overall we had the rabbits for about a year. We went through three different housing set ups for them. In the end I will say that I learned a lot, especially how not to house them. Also after doing the math with the amount of money I was spending to feed the rabbits and how much in a perfect world I could make off them it added up to me making negative six cents per baby bunny I raised up to selling age... Yes I was losing money even if I was breeding the maximum amount of times per year, getting the maximum amount of kits per litter, and each kit got to 5 lbs I'd still be losing money.
Since that "learning experience" I have done my homework and I've seen even more of my mistakes. For example when we first got the rabbits they were to young to breed. We knew this and didn't start trying until after they were of age. Two problems with the timing. When we got them it was about the end of summer still pretty warm in georgia around that time. On particularly hot days we already knew to freeze water bottles and give them to the rabbits to cool off.
At least that we did right. Unfortunately we did this when we felt it was hot out. We didn't think to see if the rabbits felt it was hot out. Did you know that when a male rabbit is exposed to heat over 85 degrees it can go sterile for several months? I sure didn't. We gave them ice to keep them cool, we even misted the rabbits with the garden hose to help, but the temperatures were in the high 80s to low 90s when we did this. So heading into the fall the boys were sterile. When we tried to breed them nothing happened. We continued into the winter and nothing happened. Many rabbits don't breed during winter.
As I said since then I've done my homework. I still have the old all wire cages and chewed up hutch in my backyard to provide me with motivation. I've redesigned the hutch ( on paper ) to include an underground area for them to hide and remain cool in while giving them more floor space and giving their feet a break from the wire floor. I've also managed to design it in a way that will make cleaning it very easy and keep them sheltered from wind and rain. I've also done my homework on feeding them healthier but cheaper meals! So this time around when I do start up again the system will be much more planned out, and I will be much more prepared. I will be sure to post pictures on this blog when construction begins, but all of this will be in my successful rabbitry post not in this fail blog. Be sure to follow this blog so you will know when and how I will do it!
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