Rabbits Under a Deck: Evicting Them Without Trapping a Litter

Before you close anything up: check whether there are kits under there. Sealing a nest in is the one mistake that turns a minor nuisance into a dead animal under your decking.

First: is anything living there?

What a cottontail nest looks like: a shallow scrape in the ground, lined with dry grass and the mother’s own fur, often covered so neatly it reads as a random patch of grass. Look for loose grass and fluff in a sheltered corner, and for worn runs converging on one opening.

Nesting season is roughly March to September, with several litters. In that window, assume young until you have looked with a torch.

If there are kits

Leave them, and wait. This is short.

• Three weeks in the nest, and they are gone
• The mother visits twice a day only, at dawn and dusk. This is normal cottontail behaviour and it is why nests constantly appear abandoned
• Do not feed or handle them. Hand-raised wild rabbits almost never survive, and it is illegal without a permit in most states
• Keep dogs and cats away and do not mow near the nest
• If a nest is genuinely destroyed, call a licensed wildlife rehabilitator

A few weeks of patience is the entire cost, and it is far cheaper than lifting decking later.

Is it worth doing at all?

Honestly assessed, rabbits are among the more benign things that get under a deck:

• They do not chew structure or wiring. Rodents do
• Droppings accumulate, which is the usual complaint
• They eat what is planted nearby — the real grievance for most people
• Digging against footings can cause minor settling on a light structure
• An existing opening attracts successors — rats, skunks, groundhogs. This is the strongest argument for closing it

If the deck is high and they only shelter underneath without burrowing, the case for intervening is weak.

Encouraging them out

Once you are certain there are no young, make the space unappealing rather than trapping anything:

• Open it up. Remove stored wood, clutter and leaf litter from underneath
• Light and noise at the entrance for a few days — a radio, a work light
• Clear cover nearby — brush piles, tall grass, dense shrubs against the deck
• Remove the food. Fallen fruit, spilled birdseed, a vegetable bed within reach
• A dog in the yard does more than any repellent

Then run the newspaper test again before closing up.

The permanent fix

The outward apron is the part that works. A rabbit digs down where it meets the barrier, hits the horizontal mesh, and stops. Straight-down mesh just gets undermined.

1. Trench 12 inches around the deck perimeter
2. Cut the hardware cloth with 12 inches spare at the bottom
3. Bend that spare outward, away from the deck, into an L
4. Fix the top to the deck framing or a batten. No gaps — two inches is enough for a rabbit
5. Backfill with soil and gravel, and tamp it
6. Leave one opening with a one-way door if there is any doubt, and close it after a week
7. Dress the front with lattice or skirting board over the mesh if you want it to look deliberate

While you are at it

Rabbits under a deck usually come with rabbits in the garden:

• One-inch or finer mesh fencing, at least two feet high, buried six to twelve inches with the base turned outward
• Tree guards on young trunks — winter bark stripping kills more young trees than summer browsing
• Clear brush piles and long grass near the beds
• Repellents work briefly, and need reapplying after every rain. Fencing does not

Do not trap and relocate. It is illegal in many states, spreads disease, and a relocated cottontail dropped into unfamiliar territory usually dies within days.