Thought I'd throw this out here. My son did an Eagle Scout project at a rabbit sanctuary just east of San Antonio last year. The sanctuary had a lot of problems with coyotes, dogs, lots of snakes, coons etc. Regular chicken wire was not an effective barrier. Chain link worked for coyotes and dogs, but snakes of course would go right through. One day while we were there working we killed four snakes going through the fencing into the pens.
My son's project was to provide a predator proof pen for rabbits to live in. It had to provide room, ability to tunnel and burrow, protection from wind, rain, raptors, coyotes, dogs, snakes etc.
He ended up having a contractor use a backhoe and dig out a 20x20 hole, 3 feet deep.
Then we lined the bottom and sides (up to 3 feet above ground level) of this swimming pool sized hole with hardware cloth.
Then he had a contractor bring in 7 yards of gravel and we put that in the bottom of the hole abut 6-8 inches deep.
Then we backfilled with the dirt the original contractor had removed.
We installed 10' chain link fence panels around the perimeter with an exterior gate. Added two panels across the middle to create two pens with a gate to go between.
Then we tied all the hardware cloth to the chain link 3 feet up every part of the chain link external and across the middle.
We added a tin roof over the top with a good pitch to it. It is just over 6' high (I could walk through it).
Added two plastic igloo dog houses to each side of the pen for the rabbits to get in for weather protection. They can also burrow down about 2.5 feet but can't tunnel under the fencing.
I'll tried to attach pics, hope it works. The total cost of donated work, materials and construction equipment came out to about 10k. But... it's a NICE rabbit pen!
My son's project was to provide a predator proof pen for rabbits to live in. It had to provide room, ability to tunnel and burrow, protection from wind, rain, raptors, coyotes, dogs, snakes etc.
He ended up having a contractor use a backhoe and dig out a 20x20 hole, 3 feet deep.
Then we lined the bottom and sides (up to 3 feet above ground level) of this swimming pool sized hole with hardware cloth.
Then he had a contractor bring in 7 yards of gravel and we put that in the bottom of the hole abut 6-8 inches deep.
Then we backfilled with the dirt the original contractor had removed.
We installed 10' chain link fence panels around the perimeter with an exterior gate. Added two panels across the middle to create two pens with a gate to go between.
Then we tied all the hardware cloth to the chain link 3 feet up every part of the chain link external and across the middle.
We added a tin roof over the top with a good pitch to it. It is just over 6' high (I could walk through it).
Added two plastic igloo dog houses to each side of the pen for the rabbits to get in for weather protection. They can also burrow down about 2.5 feet but can't tunnel under the fencing.
I'll tried to attach pics, hope it works. The total cost of donated work, materials and construction equipment came out to about 10k. But... it's a NICE rabbit pen!
Predator proof rabbit pen...
