I am getting a communal rabbit hutch!!

[warmfuzzies]

I am so excited! I just found out that we are getting a old outhouse, we are going to turn it into a rabbit home. I am planning to get some hardware cloth and make some different levels, and make a small run outside for them.

There will be (eventually) three does and two bucks in there. The bucks are brothers, they have lived together all their lives, so I dont think we will have problems there.

Has anyone ever done this, with rabbits in colonies? I need some advice about it. I have heard that they do it alot in Europe.

 

[mekasmom]

I raise rabbits in a colony. It is much easier than using individual hutches. The only downside is that you don't know when or who are reproducing. The good thing about it is that production is very high. I clean out my rabbits often, but always have more. Right now I have 9 pregnant does with another two that already have a nest of bunnies. They are probably pregnant again by now too. In a colony you always have more rabbits even after you clean out a bunch.

I have mine in a rabbit shed with a concrete floor and lots of wooden nesting boxes.

 

[NewHopePoultry]

Even if they have been raised together, you may end up with some fighting between the tw o bucks. In most cases if you add females, fighting will happen.
colonies work better then cages if you know what your doing. Plan on having lots of babies!

 

[warmfuzzies]

When I am ready to put them in, is it better to put them all in at the same time? And should there be enough seperate waterers and feeders for them all, so they dont fight over them and they all get enough?

 

[mekasmom]

I just put them all in. I keep some hay for chewing along with food bowl and big dishpan of water.
I have three bucks in the colony right now. No fighting. Lots of females and babies.

 

[cutiepieacres]

I havent raised rabbits in colonies but have raised rabbits and I would think you would need to pull does out of the colony after a litter or two to give her a break for awhile and avoid breedback after breedback as letting rabbits become pregnant while still nursing is very hard on their bodies and while they may have the fat stores and nutrients for one maybe two times after that they may become unthrifty and unhealthy.
Make sure you have a place for the babies to be pulled and separated by sex at 8 weeks so you dont have any inbreeding in your colony and an outlet for babie bunnies so your arent over run with rabbits at any point.

 

[mekasmom]

If the rabbits are used as a food source, you don't really worry about who is Mom or Dad. If you want to have registered show rabbits that would be a different issue.

 

[warmfuzzies]

Thanks for all the help! We arent worried about keeping breeding lines sepperate or anything. And I will be keeping our other hutch in case I need to seperate one for something. A quarentine cage.

 

[Feathered Wings]

I would not do this

Bucks could fight and the never ending breeding is cruel and abusive to the does.
Bucks will mount does repeatdly if allowed even when pregnant this is unfair to the doe's who are trapped with the males.
Rabbits will breed and rebreed thus it turns into rabbits you don't know what to do with.
So they are given away or put down because they are unwanted!

This is no different than a puppy mill and just as bad!!!

 

[NoelTate]

I raised and showed rabbits for years, and I would agree with some of the opinions here. If you ever want to show your rabbits, you must have a pedigree.
Even if you are raising rabbits for food, you surely want to treat them as humanely as possible. Allowing bucks constant access to the does is really cruel to the does, and allowing the does to have so many litters is horribly cruel. It will shorten their lifespans. They will have babies every 31 days. They will breed as soon as they drop a litter. It is cruel and abusive and will kill them.
My suggestion would be to create two communal pens-one for bucks and one for does. Put a buck in with the does when you want to have babies, but space the litters out to allow the does to recover from raising their previous litters.