Two storey rabbit hutch - how best to lay out hay etc?

Hi,

We've a two story rabbit hutch with a slope leading down to the lower section and the upper one is split into two sections (one area with no mesh/grill just a hole for them to go between the sections.

How best do we put down hay and if possible an area for them to litter/train?

Ideally I'd like:

Sleeping/bedding/munching area (upstairs I guess is where it's designed to be)

Litter area on the side (preferably downstairs)

Do I just lay down hay everywhere on top floor?

Just some litter to the side/in a tray on the bottom floor?

Where should I put the water bottle?

Ideally I want them to be feeding and sleeping upstairs and doing their business downstairs, as it has a slideout floor underneath which would make it easier to clean up?


Can I train them to do this?

They pee and poo where they eat, so your hay area and your litter area should/will be one and the same. Are they neutered? If not, litter training can be difficult. You will also want to put hay in the sleeping area, to keep them warm. You can use straw but it doesn't insulate as well as hay, so in this weather hay is best.

:wave:

I'm afraid it will be up to the bunnies to decide where they toilet! I haven't had a rabbit yet that has used the bed area and rabbits will sleep where they want to sleep, never where we want them to unfortunately!
Find where they poo/wee and put the litter tray there. Mine will use their litter tray where ever I put it, I fill it with hay and they spend most of their time in it eating so ultimately use it as a toilet.

Keep food /water upstairs if you want. Put a litter tray (line it with newspaper and foll it with hay) downstairs where you want it and see if they use it as that, if they do then great but if not then I'm afraid you'll have to move it keep hay racks close to the litter tray too. Rabbits like to eat while they poo and wee. If you put hay everywhere then they might just toilet everywhere. I used lino in my pairs hutch and they have lino in their shed now.

Hi they are 9-12 weeks and I've been advised to neuter them roughly 4 months from now.

I'ld just like to get the best layout for them, for this 2 storey hutch.

So just hay in sleeping area and somewhere downstairs where they'll eat and poop?

Right now I've hay all over the top floor (bedding area and the area around the slope) and some hay with litter to the side of the bottom floor.

They are pooping all over top floor lol

Where you put hay is more then likely where they will toilet. That's what happened with all of mine anyway

Neutered/spayed rabbits are easier to litter train. They don't feel the need to spray and poo everywhere and mark their territory. Keep an eye on them for fighting, as soon as their hormones kick in it could end nasty. Is it a boy/boy pair? If so, as soon as their balls drop I would have them neutered, boys can be difficult to bond after falling out and when rabbits fight they can cause a lot of damage.

What size is their set up? The minimum recommended for 2 buns is a 6 x 2 x 2 hutch with a 8 x 4 run attached :wave:

Hi it's 6x4x4 fairly big, I'm going to attach a run area in the next few days and eventually they'll have the 100ft garden to roam around in But right now just trying to get a nice starting set up for them to be happy with (and at same time trying to make it a bit easier of us to keep clean/tidy too hence trying to train them!)

They are boy/boy so yes I'll have to get them neutered as soon as possible. One white, one brown. I'm trying to find the best way to train them up a bit so they use one or two places to do their business and basically return to the hutch to sleep and have food (that's longer term plan anyway)

It will be a lot easier once they are neutered when they have access to the garden make sure it's bunny proof! They are escape artists also watch out for predators as they are rather quick off the mark if they see something they want My outdoor rabbits have an indoor cage as a litter tray and one of my indoor rabbits has a 32L storage box (was £3.50 from wilkinsons!) which are much better than cat litter trays as they have higher sides when rabbits wee they lift their bums up so wee usually goes over the edge of cat litter trays

Here are my rabbits litter trays - Literally, they only wee and poo in their litter trays. I still find the odd poo but you can't expect perfection :lol: Get a 32L sotrage box/underbed storage box or a larger cat litter tray and line it with newspaper and fill it with hay at the top and bottom of the hutch you can line it with lino or get some blankets and towels instead just keep an eye on them in case they chew it up

Leo's is in the middle of the room. He moves it all over the place but will only ever wee and poo in there



Donny and Lola have an indoor cage as a litter tray They have hay racks in other places but they're really good with their litter tray as I started litter training them as soon as I got them

Hi, thanks for the quick and helpful advice! Ok I got some good ideas how to proceed.

I have currently the top floor covered with hay, downstairs has the water bottle and side area which (I'd hoped they would use) for litter + some hay there too.

So far they seem to be ok going up and down, eating upstairs and downstairs (mostly upstairs) and coming down for water but can't seem to influence them too much yet where to do their businesses. I like your layouts though, it gives me some ideas:

Put some carpet or other lino on the floor upstairs + tray for litter/food and add some hay racks maybe, sound like a plan?

Hey guys! Well this morning I came down to check them (it's their first night here!) and they are doing fine going up and down the ramp. Their pooping seems to be getting more organised but still a bit all over the place.

I'm going to put some fresh hay for them shortly, should I continue just putting it everywhere on the top floor and some downstairs near/on litter area (or at least the place I'm trying to encourage them to go to!)

Or just hay in the sleeping compartment and stairs side area?

What about food bowl e.g. for fresh veg etc?

I just worry because if they're sleeping eating and pooping all in the same place, that might not be too healthy?

Our hutch is like this (currently, not added the run yet)



So some ideas how best to put things down with a view to trying to encourage/train them to use one or two places? I know they will go where they like but can't hurt to try to litter train them in the mean time? Those pics above look way more organised than ours currently lol there's hay all over the place this morning haha, I got plenty of cleaning up to do in a bit I guess

Can I suggest putting a barrier up next to the opening if the ramp and at the side of the ramp. I did this when I used a double hutch. I am probably over paranoid but I once lost a rabbit as he broke his back I suspect by falling down the ramp/hole. If they have a scuffle at the top one can easily drop down and it's easy for a rabbit to fall funny or struggle on the way down and hurt their back I'll c if I can find a pic that shows the barriers. I used to put the food at top here and the barrier also made it easier to keep it neat (except when Heidi lived there, she'd make a mess in an empty room :lol Good luck with them :wave:

I think that hutch is 4ft double? If so it's really not big enough for 1 rabbit let alone 2 so I would attach the run asap :wave:

Here are some ideas for outdoor housing

http://forums.rabbitrehome.org.uk/showthread.php?311878-Outdoor-Housing

http://forums.rabbitrehome.org.uk/s...door-Housing&p=5207975&viewfull=1#post5207975

Regarding if it's unhealthy, mine are still here and healthy and they have been pooing, weeing and eating in the same place for 2+ years They will toilet where there is hay so wherever you want to put litter trays full of hay, that is most likely where they will wee and poo. If you put hay all over the place then they will toilet all over the place

You can have a bowl for veg if you want but I wouldn't start feeding veg until they are about 5/6 months old. Rabbits have very delicate tummies so when they are old enough, introduce it slowly and stick to green things. Spring greens etc. Herbs are better for their tummies, it's more like the natural roughage. Things like carrots and banana are full of sugar so feed as a treat. Carrot tops are a better option

Please ignore the state if the hutch it was in a bad way which is why it's no longer used!! But u can see the barrier I put up on the top level...



And here u can just c the barrier I put up next to the ramp...


I put water bottles on each level.

Sorry can't help with the layout thing anymore than what others have said!

Hi that picture was just one I found randomly to show what kind of hutch it is, double decker with ramp and enclosed bed area at top.

Our one is quite big, about 6ft tall and quite wide but I don't want them living full time in hutch either. Hopefully long term they will be more outdoor rabbit and have the hutch just to sleep/eat in (and have free run of the huge garden we have for a few hours at a time). The run I'm building myself so it will be quite large and on the garden so they get used to it then eventually to the garden proper itself. Nothing fancy just a big mesh enclosed area with wood supports, but should keep them safe and give them plenty of room to run around in

About the barrier: yeah I have that in mind to do for the downward slope as well, and put carpet grips on it to make it easier for them to get up/down. But good idea to do the top entrance as well.

Ok maybe I'll try to tidy up the top floor hay a bit, a tray or two to try to encourage them to go in certain places rather than all over the place.. makes my life a bit easier to try to clean up too :lol:

Thanks for the tip about food by the way, I need to do more research! The pet shop people told me the basics and when to feed them, the lady also said we could feed them small bits of fruit/veg like apples etc. I think I'll read some more carefully before doing that now

Oh I've another question, does it really make a difference to have the hay dispenser/feeder? If you have hay all over the floor anyway? Won't they eat from everywhere anyway?

Yeah, pet shops aren't always the best place for advice. Most just want you to buy things.

Diet wise - 90% hay, 5% pellets and 5% veg/herbs. No veg yet and apples are watery so I would avoid those. They can be a treat once they are older though. They can have more pellets as they are young but once they are older I would cut it down to a small handful between them. That's what my pair have. What food do they have? If it's a muesli I would recommend moving them onto a pellet. Once they have settled in you can do this It should be done over a period of 3+ weeks to prevent upset tummies. Science selective and excel are fed on here a lot

Being pet shop rabbits I would take them to the vets to get vet checked and sexed properly. Young rabbits can be hard to sex and accidental litters usually occur because of mix sexing in pet shops.

What's a hay dispenser? :lol: a hay rack? Mine have 3 hay racks and toilet roll tubes stuffed with hay which they empty daily and their litter tray but will frequently eat 2 day old hay off the floor that I haven't swept up :roll:

We're from cats and fish family (back at the family home, no other pets at our house) so I guess I just called it a dispenser from the fish side of things :lol: Foodwise we've not fed them any fruit/veg yet, mostly hay and will give some pellets in a bit. Thanks for the pointers there, I've been spending hours reading online stuff and no doubt will continue for days like I did with the fish originally :lol: Last thing I want to do right now is keep disrupting them by moving things around a lot so they don't settle, just try to get something organised quickly and let them carry on.

There seemed to be quite a few different ways people set up hutches/rabbit houses etc. so I couldn't get any clear idea but it's helped to post here

At family home garden there's a cat house outside so they come and go to the human house for food/naps and have their own place outside too, very nice and tidy and were very quick to train! If I can get the bunnies to do something similar that'd be perfect. I guess it's going to be a while though before they get neutered and just have to do best that can be done in the meantime

hi i have a 2 storey hutch with a huge run attached which they have access to all day i just shut them in at night

basically they decided where they wanted to toilet which was in the area which would be the bedroom upstairs so i put a litter tray in that bit and its become their toilet area then in the connecting bit to is their bedroom which i fill with shed loads of hay and straw

they decided they would also like a downstairs wc so i popped a litter tray there as well i don't put any straw or hay on the ground floor i put their water bowl and they have their food bowl down there and a hay rack and lots of hay in the litter tray

this them using the litter tray whilst munching

Hi JWR, thanks for that. OK I think I will definitely get a hay rack or two.

I ended up putting a modified storage tub in the sleeping box area which they both seemed to spend a lot of time in, and a tray in similar position to yours in the picture. This morning they were both in the "sleeping" box area top left, but were obviously downstairs a lot too because some of their toys ended up down there and also the toilet rolls/hay roll there too (I put it upstairs yesterday) - minus the hay of course :lol:

They seem to be settling. Rabbit pills all over the ground floor again, a few upstairs outside the sleeping compartment. I am going to replace the downstairs tray with a larger storage tub like upstairs, as when I went to clean lower floor this morning and put fresh hay in the tray the white one can downstairs and decided it would be better to sit outside the tray and eat the hay that way. So I figure they might be more willing to sit inside a bigger tub downstairs too. Just waiting for the brown one to come downstairs so I can tidy upstairs a bit and see how they're using the upstairs tub.

It's better than the other day anyway, we put hay just about everywhere and it was a right mess to clean after haha

Addition: ok just checked brown one is downstairs too and also sitting outside the tray so I guess it's too small or they like the tub size better. I will change that later, now to go check upstairs and clean up/report later!

Have they got names or r they just the brown one and the white one :lol: Think we need piccies soon...!! As for hay racks I think ur best to have them so u know they've always got fresh hay that's not been soiled. But if they r messy like mine they'll just drag all the hay from the racks into the trays anyway :lol: they do seem to prefer eating from the tray. Mine love it when I put a fresh tray of hay out they get so excited even tho their racks r full of hay already :roll: Basically as ur prob learning, no matter what u try and do, rabbits will do what the heck they like :lol: Don't know if uv seen but quite a lot of people use plastic bag holders from ikea as hay racks, they're only a couple of pound and hold loads of hay :thumb:

hey sounds like they are settling in and arranging their bits and bods rabbits seem to have place for everything and everything in its place if you move stuff they move it back its so funny they know exactly where it was if i put toys in the bedroom area they chuck them down the stairs lol

yes sounds like they want a bigger tub or a litter tray your find if you keep chucking the bumbles into the litter tray they eventually catch on and it will become the wc ....mine only ever go in the litter trays now i never find bumbles anywhere else except for the ones that get stuck to their bottom when they jump out ...

i only have hay upstairs or the ground floor would be a complete mess as i have it open all day so they have access to the run but they still manage to spred the hay from the litter tray everywhere, i give them cupboard boxes full of hay they love that ..

jwr said:

hey sounds like they are settling in and arranging their bits and bods rabbits seem to have place for everything and everything in its place if you move stuff they move it back its so funny they know exactly where it was if i put toys in the bedroom area they chuck them down the stairs lol

yes sounds like they want a bigger tub or a litter tray your find if you keep chucking the bumbles into the litter tray they eventually catch on and it will become the wc ....mine only ever go in the litter trays now i never find bumbles anywhere else except for the ones that get stuck to their bottom when they jump out ...

i only have hay upstairs or the ground floor would be a complete mess as i have it open all day so they have access to the run but they still manage to spred the hay from the litter tray everywhere, i give them cupboard boxes full of hay they love that ..

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Aw those 2 r lovely and set up looks really nice and has inspired me a little too