Handy Day

There I go again forgetting my blog exists. I've been pretty busy with work and building a little home for our future furry family member. It's been a long time since I got to play with power tools, so it was fun. There was a bit an trial and error as well as agony once I realized I purchased too few 1x2's, but overall, I am pleased with how it turned out.

I started with a pile of wood and supplies that cost around $40 and a used cage I got off of a Craigslist equivalent for $15.

Pile of Materials

I had planned on making the nesting box from Ana White. (Click here for plans). I tried to do the math to tweak the plan of what I wanted to add to it, but had to change my build plan a few times during assembly.

I assembled the frames for the sides/legs first, and went from there. Essentially, you make a sandwich around the vinyl lattice with the furring strips. 

Front View

You can see the ramp that leads in to the weather protection area, which will be filled with straw and other snuggle materials.

Side View

Once I built the modified nesting box, I realized with the way I'd constructed the sides of the base, that I wouldn't be able to attach it to the back. I had to tweak the plan from here, it took a big of finagling, but I think I came out of it all with a decent design. I decided to flip it and have it longer rather than taller, because the bunny will need more laying down room in that portion of the hutch.

Rear View

The back portion of the nest box has a hinge on the top and a lock on the bottom. It'll be easy to open and clean out.

It's a little smaller than recommended, the bunny will have a little over five square feet of living space, but will get plenty of exercise time outside of the hutch as well. All that's left now is to get the feeder and watering system in place, pick up some hay and straw, and go rescue our little friend from the shelter. Oh, and get the HOA to fix that stupid loose slat in our fence. They claim it will be done on Monday, I'm not convinced.

How about all of you? Any build or redesign projects not go quite according to plan but still wound up satisfied with the results? What did you try to build and what went wrong?