Buy A Rabbit And A Rabbit Hutch To Keep Your Kids Happy
July 24, 2010 by Lifestyle Editor
Filed under Home and Family
Kids love pets and there’s so many pets to choose from. Big and small, feathered or furry there’s so many choices for parents of children who are clamouring for a pet. But in my view one of the best pets or children is a rabbit. Lets see why a rabbit is a great pet and how you go about housing their rabbit in a great rabbit hutch.
Rabbits make wonderful pets for kids. They are very social, fun to be with and love spending time with people. They can be house trained so you don’t need to worry about mess, and kids love a rabbit as a pet. A pet rabbit generally lives around 10 years so you need to understand that once you have a pet rabbit you will have one for quite some time.
Rabbits have a simple diet. It is perfectly fine to feed them dedicated rabbit pellets which you can buy from a pet shop, as well as complementing that feed with fresh hay and vegetables. A rabbit loves many dark green vegetables like spinach, broccoli leaves and carrots and is also very happy to eat various fruits such as apples and pears. Rabbits are simple and cheap to feed.
But before you rush out and buy a pet rabbit for the children you need to spend a little time thinking about housing their rabbit. You need to buy, or build, a cage for the rabbit, or what is technically known as a rabbit house. This is a cage which allows your rabbit to be housed in comfort whilst still being able to browse on grass outdoors if they wish, and which keeps him protected from predators.
Most rabbit hutches provide a sheltered area where the rabbit can sleep out of the weather as well as an area where you can hop around during the day to exercise and browse on grass. Good rabbit hutches can be moved around from place to place.
You need to be careful using wire on the floor of your hutch. Rabbits don’t like walking on wire and if the hutch is to be lifted off the ground, which can be useful in very cold or damp weather, the wire will need to be covered in some sort of material to protect the rabbit’s feet, for example hay.
If you’ve decided to use wire then it works well allowing the droppings to fall through the wire, making cleaning easier. But again if the hutch is off the ground use a material like slats that allow the rabbit droppings to fall through but which doesn’t hurt the rabbits feet.
If you don’t like the thought of wire on the floor of your rabbit hutch then you can use either wood or metal. Wood will soak up smell more, particularly of urine. Metal is a better material for the floor of your hutch as it’s easier to clean. However if you’re hutch is on the ground it doesn’t allow the rabbit to eat the grass.
What about the size of the cage? Suggestions I have seen is that it should be 3 or 4 times the size of the rabbit, but to me that is way too small. If you have a rabbit hutch this small you must allow your rabbit out to exercise every day.
And you need to clean the hutch and replace the hay each day, so you need a good door on it that allows this.
A rabbit is an excellent pet for kids. Do your research on rabbit breeds, and give yourself plenty of time before you buy one to sort out a solid, effective and well built rabbit hutch.
It’s not hard to build your own rabbit hutch, that’s part of the fun.
Written by Lifestyle Review Editor - Visit WebsiteDecide On His Rabbit Hutch Before You Buy Your First Rabbit
July 16, 2010 by Lifestyle Editor
Filed under Home and Family
There’s so many reasons why rabbits make a wonderful pet. You can housetrain rabbits, they don’t eat too much and they make wonderful companions for children as well as adults. Learning about keeping rabbits can be quite involved, but one of the earliest decisions you will need to make is whether you will keep your rabbits indoors or in an outdoors rabbit hutch.
It’s quite true that our little furry friends can be successfully kept indoors or outdoors. However there are different considerations for each. A rabbit is generally kept in a hutch, and can be kept in a hutch as easily outdoors as indoors.
If you’re looking to buy your first rabbit you should make some decisions about his housing before you buy anything. You should be aware for example that most rabbit hutches sold in pet shops or on the Internet are too small. He should be able to take at least 3 consecutive hops and be able to stand up in a hutch. Therefore it should be at least 6-7 feet long and 18 inches high. Many commercial hutches are way smaller than this, and it’s very sad to see rabbits cooped up in tiny cages.
If you have decided to keep your rabbit outdoors his rabbit cage must give him complete protection from creditors like dogs and foxes who are very clever and will get at your rabbit anyway they can. His hutch should have a sleeping area that is thoroughly weatherproof as well as an outdoor exercise area so he can play in the sun during the day.
And if you do have your rabbit in a small rabbit hutch now you can overcome this problem by building him a dedicated rabbit run around the hutch so you can allow them out during the day to run around in the run provided this is also protected from predators.
And if you are keeping your rabbit indoors there are some different considerations. Hopefully there will be no rabbit predators indoors so you do not need a roof on the rabbit hutch. However he will still need a private sleeping area where he can get away from prying eyes and sleep.
And you must avoid putting his rabbit hutch anywhere near a gas appliance, as these can leak toxic fumes. Also avoid putting him anywhere near glass where he would get very hot sun during the summer and where he may get cold during the winter.
Some people dedicate an entire room of the house to their furry friend. This is fine provided you do a thorough check for any hazards in the room including holes into which he can disappear.
There is no doubt that rabbits make a fine pet, but makes decisions well before you buy your rabbit, and in particular organise his housing beforehand.
Written by Lifestyle Review Editor - Visit Website
