Housing Rabbits outside

So you are thinking of housing your rabbits outside?

The RSPCA and RWA recommend a minimum living area of-2'592 plus an additional exercise area.
Please bear in mind the time of year that you are getting your bunnies, as winter babies may need to be housed differently from those in the summer months. Rabbits can not regulate their body temperature -so you can not keep bringing rabbits from a freezing cold hutch in to a warm home for play time and training. Are you going to be able to spend enough time with your new pet? As you will need to do all your handling and training outside with them? Are you going to be happy with the children spending hours outside? If the answer is "No" then you either need to delay homing till the spring or you need to start your bunnies either in a shed/garage in their outside hutch or have a second indoor set up for the winter months, moving the rabbits to their outside area once warmer and they are trained. The following winter they can either stay outside as they are now trained or you can bring them back indoors, to be able to continue warm training and handling.
There are many different styles of outside hutch: Here are a few of the ones we stock.
We offer discounts on some of these when collected with our bunnies

Double storey hutches

Our Malling Double Deluxe range -where both floors are raised off the ground, giving the rabbits access to both levels 24/7 ~52 weeks a year no matter what the weather is doing. These are available in two sizes: 5ft and 6ft. So you can match the right size to the breed of rabbit. They are heavy duty made of robust 10mm tongue & groove solid wood and 9mm ply floors, green felted roofs with 4mm ply under, prime 16g weld grade wire mesh, heavy duty bolts for secure door fastening, extra locks and metal turn buttons instead of the normal plastic. These are also screwed together and not just stapled.These have an in-built nest box resting area, two advantages with this is on a cold night bunnies can keep themselves snuggly in the half size nest box and secondly they will also spend many hours snoozing sitting on top of this. Another handy feature is the removable cleaning out plinth-this keeps all the bedding in the hutch rather than falling out to make a mess in the garden, this can on cleaning out day be removed allowing you to give the hutch a good clean out.

Hutch with run extention

The 5ft double storey offers a whopping combined living area space of-2'880 and the 6ft is an impressive 3'456.
With the option of a front run. which can extends the width of your hutch by 4ft deep - giving the rabbits an extra running space of: on a 5ft hutch-2'880, 6ft hutch-3'456. Side runs are also available if you have the space. Or you can attach one of our Bunny Bomb Abouts to the hutch to a garden run- the possibilities are endless There is the option of two covers- the Hutch hugger and the Hutch Snuggler, tailor made to fit the Malling hutch-completing this hutch package, and making it one of the best buys around with the added bonus of being English built.

Hutch with run under

Rabbit hutch with run enclosure under. If these are sited on grass then you must make sure that your pet is put in the upper hutch section of a night to protect it from Mr Fox and from bunny doing "the great escape" and digging out. If you have a bonded pair of bunnies or a group the upstairs level needs to be of a very good size -so the rabbits do not end up fighting. They are just as active at night as they are during the day, so halving there living area at night is not always a good idea. Make sure it is deep enough, to allow for the area that the ramp and ramp hole will take up. Always check the depth when buying else where. A lot of hutches are only 18" deep -this is far far to narrow and will not give the rabbits enough room to pass each other or lay out without the fear of falling down the hole. These we believe should not be sold as rabbit hutches. This style of hutches are not always best suites to very young rabbits, once a rabbit is trained they are fine. Cleaning out can also be interesting. We do not stock this style of hutch as we believe the option of above is far better.

Single level hutches

The Malling Single deluxe, comes in two sizes 5ft and 6ft these have the same feature benefits as the double Mallings: nest box/ resting area, cleaning out plinth, heavy duty bolts plus being built with the same material.They have the option of a run extension in two sizes and two covers, the hutch hugger and hutch snuggler. They are raised off the ground on short legs.
Single level hutches that can have runs added to the front or side are the best as this will double the area that the rabbit has. Our new Malling super extended Deluxe comes in 2 sizes, and will gives the bunnies a massive 12ft of area that's 3456 of combined living area in the 6ft hutch/6ft run option. With the advantage of being able to add a second run to the front of the hutch as well as the side run, plus you can detach the existing side run from the hutch should the weather turn cold, so you can move the hutch into a shed, garage or even indoors. You can really match this to the breed of rabbits that you home and where you situated the hutch season to season, and again it's a heavy duty English built hutch.

Never stand a hutch directly on the ground as it will quickly become damp and cold, you could even end up with an un-wanted family of mice living under the hutch- popping into the cage at meal times. So legs of at least 4" are a necessity.
Remember that the hutch needs to be solid and water proof. When making the decisions about your hutch, bear in mind the following, remembering that cheap is not always a sound investment if the hutch only lasts a year or is of such poor soft wood quality that your bunny escapes and you lose them -to Mr fox.
Make sure the door bolts secure the doors and that the wire of the cage sufficient to keep bunny in and Mr Fox out. A clever bunnies will learn how to rattle a door -so it will open. Our Malling hutches come with heavy duty bolts and extra hasps.
A hutch should be look on as an investment and if this is chosen wisely it will last for years and will not need replacing two years in to being bunny owners. Make sure it is the correct size for the breed of bunny.
If housing a pair or more of bunnies, make sure they have got enough room to get away from each other if they are having an off day with each another. Pairs or groups of rabbits living in a too smaller hutch are more likely to fight than those that have plenty of space. Our minimum recommend size hutch for a single small/medium breed of bunny is a 5ftx2ft single storey hutch, for a pair then the Double version of this is better. With an addition exercise area. If this is a independent run-then it needs to be at least twice the size of the hutch.