Fiber Friday ~ Cleaning Cages

Anyone who raises animals will tell you there is a downside to it. Whether that's mucking stalls, limited travel, making sure everyone is healthy, butchering day or shearing day, there is the good the bad and the ugly to it all. I have been raising animals for 15 years now. Our little farm started out with a flock of laying hens and morphed into meat and laying chickens, turkeys, angora rabbits, pygora goats, alpacas and mini ponies. The chickens and rabbits remain with us here today.

Angora rabbits have a lot of upkeep in themselves. You have to stay on top of grooming for the health of the rabbits. High quality feed and clean water is a must daily. Then there is the dirty job of cleaning cages. I had high hopes when we moved here to create a rabbit barn that I would be colony raising most of my rabbit in. Due to finances and life, that still hasn't happened. This will hopefully be something we are able to do in the next year or so.

Photo courtesy Shed Craft 

For now, I am still raising my 20 or so rabbits in cages. In the past I have cleaned cages weekly, monthly and quarterly. I have found a process that works the best for me now and that is weekly cleanings. 

 These bags are AWESOME for this task and can be found at Amazon here: Garden Waste Bags at Amazon

I simply dump each bottom into this bag:

Then hose out right over the edge of the garden! It takes me about a half an hour a week and it is so much easier than letting things go.

 The bag can then be put directly into the garden. I also have a neighbor who likes it for her garden and the bags are super tough, we can just drag it up the hill to her and share the love!