Casa De Critters--lots of pics

[joyfulferrets]

My boyfriend and I have made a couple of custom cages and would like to make some more to auction off to support the ferret rescue that we work with. The first one was pretty small, perfect for 2-4 ferrets. Our current one holds our 9 babies very comfortably. When we first brought it in the house and set it up, they all stopped sleeping in their favorite hidey-holes around the house and started sleeping in the cage. Since they're free roam, I felt bad at first because they were spending so much more time in the cage, but I figure they must really love it since they can come and go as they please. Here's some pics: (my apologies for the pics of the bad food, we're going raw very, very soon)

Full front including ramp (our plastic hooks for our Christmas stockings are still on the door  )
The two doors on the bottom are used for storing food, bedding, nail clippers, etc, etc.

Close up of ramp to show the scoring for traction 

Misha demonstrating how the bowls work   
We call the top level the Penthouse, there's a board in the back so they can access both sides. There's a ramp on the top left they can use to get up there, but they also climb up the wire on the back. There's a "catwalk" on the right side and back wall(you can't really see it on the back wall because the beds are in the way) and another ramp leading up to that "catwalk" in the middle.

Back corner of 1st floor showing access to "basement" 

Showing the "basement" doors open and the confused kitten-ferret sleeping in there and some stashed toys

Simon wondering why I opened the door and woke him up 

Showing bathroom door (velcro tape on the floor to secure food bowls to it when I use them)

Another view of the bathroom door and bathroom construction. That front piece of plexiglass comes out for easy cleaning

Liam demonstrating how to use one of the ramps

[Aftershock]

That's awesome! I love it!

[Deleted]

This is so cool!!

[Heather]

That is quite ingenious. Well done
ciao

[Deleted]

I would totally buy a cage like this! It looks so nice

[unclejoe]

It's really beautiful.. I want to do a cage like that myself someday. If i can ever get a batch of ferrets that are 100% with litter boxes.

[joyfulferrets]

unclejoe
Mine are definitely not 100% litter box trained lol. Maybe 50% (on a good day 😄) They were doing really well until we added the last half of our 9: two kits, and two old men that are newspaper trained. Bad habits spread like a virus lol. I gave up on a litterbox inside the cage after we moved our first 4 into our first custom cage. It had a separate bathroom like our current cage and when I put the litterbox in, they'd just push it out of the way and poop in the corner and against the far wall. I took it out and they kept going in the same places. So that was that. I never had a problem with having to teach anyone where the potty place was. In our current cage, we occasionally get accidents on the catwalk, but I think that's just lazy fuzzbutts not wanting to climb all the way down to the bathroom. The nice part about customizing your own cage is that you can plan for those accidents and make everything super easy to clean. The whole inside is sealed waterproof so I could take a hose to it if I wanted to. In the bathroom, I put down a thick layer of newspaper and then some shredded cardboard bedding against the two far walls for absorption and to keep their feet cleaner. It's worked really well.

[Deleted]

Amazing cage!!!! Wow. You have thought of everything!

[Deleted]

Wow, that looks amazing. How did you seal the inside? I've been thinking of making a cage in this cabinet style, but one of the things stopping me is how much people say the wood stinks. I don't know anything about sealing wood, and I don't want to waste a bunch of time and money on a cage I can't use.

[joyfulferrets]

tanya
Our first custom cage was originally for a rabbit. We converted it, added ramps and extra levels and hammocks. The bathroom in that one was lined with thin sheet metal and the levels were just painted because the rabbit only used the bottom level. The paint wore off and accidents would seep down between the edges and it was so hard to clean. And yes, it started to stink. So when we made this one, we had experience with all the things that make a custom cage hard to keep clean and improved on them. This was built with cleanliness and accessibility in mind every step of the way.
We used a water based polycrylic to seal most of it. I sealed both sides of the wood and all the edges. The ramps and catwalk are sealed with truck bed liner so they'd have better traction and not slip off and it's still waterproof. All of the edges are sealed with silicone to keep stuff from leaking through between the pieces. I used a thin bead on top and bottom, let it cure, and then repeated until the silicone was the thickness I needed without it having any bulges or clumps that they could get a hold of if they decided it smelled like something they wanted to chew/scratch/steal. Fortunately none of them have ever tried. The bathroom is lined with plexiglass and the edges sealed with silicone, and the wood under the plexiglass is sealed with polycrylic too.
This is the first one we've designed from scratch and we've made a few adjustments once we put it in use, but overall, I'm really happy with it. And I really like that it's prettier than a metal cage since it sits in my living room.