Healthy Bunnies
Your hobby will be much more enjoyable if you maintain healthy stock. To do so invest in good, healthy stock with good genetic makeup. Control their living environment, including appropriate housing and equipment. Provide good nutrition for your bunnies, and plenty of clean, fresh water. Finally, stay ahead of illnesses and diseases; be pro-active about cleanliness. If an animal does contract an illness, treat the animal appropriately to cure it and sanitize your rabbitry it to avoid transmission.
This hobby is more complicated than simply owning a bunny. They can, and do, get sick. Be a responsible owner and be prepared to deal with those issues. Interact with your stock. Observe behavior and general demeanor, you can tell a lot about your stock by just observing them and handling them. When needed, the internet is a great source of information for care and treatment of your stock.
Environment and Housing
Think about where you will be keeping your rabbits. Rabbits thrive in environments that foster good health. The location of your cages should be out of the sun and wind. If they can be inside, that's great. If they are outside, provide protection from the elements, such as a solid roof and a hutch box, or consider covering the roof and 3 sides of the hutch. You will also want to be certain other animals can't get to the rabbits.
If your rabbits are inside you really don't need to air conditon or heat your building, just be certain there is air movement and air exchange.
An all wire cage is great for many reasons: easy to clean, easy to handle, adaptable for indoor or outdoor use, more sanitary.
Equipment
Feeders come in all shapes and sizes. There are all metal self-feeders that mount through a hole cut in the cage wire. There are plastic cups that secure to the cage wire with a clip, and there are ceramic and plastic crocks. What you use depends on what you have access to and what works best with your setup. Be sure the feeder you choose is the appropriate size to accommodate your rabbit. The crocks and plastic cups can also double as water bowls. Hanging water bottles can also be used. Feeder bowls, water bottles and water bowls should be kept clean and periodically disinfected.
Fresh water should be available to rabbits at all times. Water bowls/bottles should be dumped daily and re-filled with clean water. Larger rabbitries may use a closed watering system, consisting of a water source, plastic/pvc piping routed to all cages, and self-tap founts (valves) for the rabbits to drink from. The choice is yours.
Nest Boxes
If you are going to breed your rabbits a nest box will be necessary. Nest boxes can be made of wood or metal. Wood boxes tend to retain heat better than metal boxes, however wood boxes are more difficult to keep clean and sanitized. Metal boxes usually have removable bottoms for easy cleaning and replacement. Metal boxes tend to lend themselves to better sanitation and will last longer.
Feed
The feed (pellet) you use may be determined by what is available in your area, and what you want to spend per bag. There are many feed companies such as: Purina, Kent, Nutrena, Pen Pals, Hubbard, Nutritional Research, etc. If you are going to breed and show your rabbits, use a good rabbit pellet. It doesn't have to be the most expensive, but it should give your rabbit good nutrition. If you are feeding a farm store's in-house brand of rabbit feed for example, chances are it will not have the nutrition necessary to maintain good show stock.
To provide good nutrition to your rabbits, consider a feed that has between 16 and 18% crude protein, 2 to 4% fat, and 15 to 16% fiber. The feed should include a variety of grains (soy, wheat, alfalfa, ground corn and oats) and supplements (vitamins and minerals, magnesium oxide, salt).
Talk to other breeders. What feed do they use? Is it available in your area? Is the cost within your budget?
Our experience with feeding is mature mini lops only require 1/2 cup to 2/3 cup of feed each day. We free-feed our juveniles, allowing them to eat all they want until they reach about 3 months of age. At that point we put them on the mature rabbit ration. We suppliment hay periodically. We also suppliment whole, cleaned oats and sunflower seeds. Our show animals also get a show enhancer, like Show Bloom or Doc's Enhancer.
Do not overfeed your animals. Overweight bucks and does may be reluctant to breed and conceive. Overweight animals will also be disqualified from a show.