How We Clean Out Our Rabbit Hutches 

Introduction 

Rabbits try to keep things clean, but they can only do it to a certain extent. They push dirty shavings under clean ones, pull hay out of hay feeders and cover the ground with it, but eventually you have to clean. Not eventually but quite often actually. Today I will tell you how we clean out our rabbit hutches. We also have colony pens to clean out, but I tell you how we clean out the colony pens in this blog post.

The Hutches 

Our hutches are wooden with a wire front, but you can get fully wire ones. We have one hutch that is a single decker, one hutch that is a double decker with a non-removable ladder, another hutch that is a double decker with no ladder, and one triple decker hutch with removable ladders between all floors, and one 4-foot double decker with no ladder. All of the hutches listed here unless stated are 6-foot ones. 

Spot Cleans 

We do a spot clean every day. A spot clean is where we scrape out any soiled bedding and put some fresh shavings in.

What Bedding We Use 

We use kiln dried pine shavings because they are safe for rabbits. If you wanted a recycled bedding mix you could use shredded newspaper. 

Full Cleans 

We do a full clean every week. A full clean is where you clean absolutely everything out whether it is soiled or not. These take about half an hour per hutch. 

The Tools 

We use poo scrapers for part of the job. You can buy them at your local pet shop, but if you have a decorating scraper that will work just as well. We also use small brushes like you might use for sweeping up piles in your house. We use small dustpans too. We the dustpans with both the scraper and the brush. 

How We Do a Full Clean 

First, we use the scraper and the dustpan to get out the bulk of the dirt into our container. Then we use the brush to sweep out the last of the shavings. And then we use some white vinegar in a spray bottle to disinfect the hutch by spraying it on the hutch and using a scrubbing brush to spread it around the hutch, or you can use a ground and bedding disinfectant powder. 

After it’s dry, we put in a fresh layer of shavings. Sometimes the rabbits are very funny because they jump into the poo buckets when we are trying to clean, such as in the picture above.