Moving Day

     The original plan was to make our own custom rabbit cages or hutches for the new rabbits but life has been quite a bit more hectic than we had anticipated lately! Mr. J has been working overtime almost every day and on the weekends, alternating between 1st and 2nd shift, so he has been just barely skating by on sleep and I just haven't had the heart to ask him to do one more thing, so...
   







     I have been checking on Craigslist and Uncle Henry's daily since we got Hazel an Ivy hoping to find exactly what I envisioned for exactly the right price and I finally found a deal I just could not pass up. It is not exactly what we would have built but the price was right and now the girls can get out of the basement and outside near the other farm animals where they belong.

 
      I had to do some scrubbing, but we got 3 hutches, 4 water bottles, 2 heated water bowls, 4 misc. hook on dishes, almost an entire bag of feed,  2 gravity feeders, and 2 hay holders (?) all for about half of what the price of the supplies would have been, not including the hutches!!! I'd say that's a pretty good deal, and the best part is that all Mr. J had to do was help me pick them up, wait for the kids and I to clean them, and then move them to the back yard near the goat pen/shelter. Now I don't have to feel quite as guilty for adding rabbits to the farm, and one more thing to his "To Do List!"
  Right now we only need to use one hutch for the two girls but in a few months when I breed them, we will need a place for the buck, as well as a way to separate the mothers while they're nesting and tending to their babies.

 

     As you can see, the goats were just a little bit curious about their new neighbors' house. Aspen thought the hutch was for her and climbed right in! She did the very same thing all summer with the temporary duck/chick house. Any chance she had, she would jump right in!

     Even though Mr. J had to work overtime today, we had a bit of family fun carting the hutches and rabbit supplies to the back yard with the tractor in the morning before he had to leave. We even took the scenic route back through the woods a few times, which was just as much fun for me as it was for the kids, I think.

     As for the rabbits, I don't think they're all too impressed with their new digs. I'm sure it will just take a little time for them to get used to the hutch, fresh air, and noisy neighbors. It's hard to tell in the pictures, but the hutch is well protected from the elements under the lean-to part of Mr. J's shop, and will only be more protected from drafts and cold once the goat shelter renovations are completed in the next few days or so.