# A few questions from a new guy



## Myke (Feb 21, 2011)

Hello all, I just found this site and haven't searched a whole lot, so please forgive me for asking questions that have probably already been covered. First, I read that a buck and 2 does can produce between 120 and 150 pounds of meat per year, is that true? Second, does anyone know if it's legal to raise rabbits in Colorado Springs? I did a search on the web but couldn't find anything on rabbits, just chickens. Also,I've hunted cottontails and I like the gamey taste, but my wife and kids didn't much care for it. I read in a book that domestic rabbit is all white meat and tastes better than wild cottontail. Has anyone eaten both that can confirm or deny that? And finally, for this post anyway, how did you go about convincing your significant other that raising rabbits and chickens in the back yard makes sense? My wife is worried about the smell, worried about eating a cute little bunny rabbit, worried about the neighbors, thinks it will cost too much and on, and on........... Thanks for any questions you can answer or advice.
Myke


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## tortoise (Feb 21, 2011)

I have not had cottontail, but domestic rabbit tastes like sweet chicken.  Fabulously yummy!  Not at all gamey.

A doe should produce around 10 kits per litter.  Gestation is 30 days.  A doe can be bred the day she kindles.  A doe is *capable* of producing 12 litters per year.  I have never met someone who breeds that hard!

So you *can* get 240 kits per year.  Grow each out to 6 pounds and you've got 2 does, 1 buck producing 1,440 pounds of meat in a year.

That's the maximum, you will never get more than that!  It doesn't allow for breedings that don't "take," miscarriage, culling day old kits for unshowable characteristics.  It doesn't account for giving the does a break so that they can maintain a healthy body condition.

I have never bred more than once every-other month (per doe).  I was also culling her litters from 11 - 12 down to 6 - less stress on her body.

Breeding hard can cause pastuerella carriers fo have symptoms - and pastuerella is highly contagious.  The treatment for it is expensive and makes the meat inedible.  The disease makes the meat inedible.  You don't want to go down this road.

The number you have would be breeding 2 does 2 times per year.  Yes, absolutely feasible.  So is more.


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## hoodat (Feb 21, 2011)

So far as table quality goes it's purely a matter of taste. Cottontails can be very good, depending on what they have been eating but snowshoes? Well what can I say? There is no better meat anywhere for me.
Domestic rabbit can be very good but the meat is very mild tasting so it mostly depends on what spices you use and how it is cooked. It makes an excellent low fat chili and the French have developed many recipes for it. Hasenpheffer is also excellent. With the possible exception of free range chickens there is no other animal that gives you more meat per pound of feed that can be kept in a suburban back yard.


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## tortoise (Feb 21, 2011)

I love rabbit legs roasted.  Sprinkle a bit of Lawry's on top.  I always end up making fajitas with the loin - which is a shame, but the easiest thing for me.

Basically take any recipe for cut up chicken and use it.


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## dewey (Feb 22, 2011)

Depending on your average, very well managed meat breeding program and breed, a couple of does can produce double+  that amount.  

I've hunted and eaten plenty of wild rabbits for over 30 years and there's no way to compare the 2 flavors in my book.  Day and night difference.  Domestic rabbit meat that's processed as fryers is mild, sweet, tender, all white, and not at all the same flavor as wild rabbit, and not at all gamey tasting.  It does not taste like chicken to me although it's very similar to chicken in the sense that it's a mellow blank canvas to flavor as desired.

Rabbits are quiet and take little space to raise and process.  Neighbors would not know they're being raised unless the fact is advertised.  

Store purchased rabbit meat goes for a very low end of $8 per pound to $12 per pound here.  Maybe consider cooking your spouse a dinner using a wonderful recipe with store purchased to see how it goes.  Give it a few tries.  Hopefully you can cook for her and not expect her to cook an unfamiliar meat that she's not even sure of.  Some people will come around with time to raising their own food, others won't, even though rabbit has the lowest feed/meat ratio while being the healthiest of any meat.  

Good luck!


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## savingdogs (Feb 22, 2011)

Rabbits are not smelly, as long as you clean up after them. Their waste is useful so clean up seems to have more "point" to it. 
I'm raising ducks and chicken for meat as well and rabbits are by far the easiest to care for.


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## KrystalMarie (Feb 22, 2011)

150# seems a pretty conservative number should be fine. I prsonally wouldnt breed more agressivly than that. You need to give the doe time to wean the kitts and gain her health back for  a couple weeks before kindling again. Rabbit meat is IMO better than chicken it will absorb the flavors of the spices that you use better than chicken. I also prefer butchuring rabbits to chickens, for me it is quicker and cleaner. Dont worry about those cute little ears you cannot eat them anyway LOL. It took me 10 Yrs to convince my wife to get chickens, But now she acts like it was her idea. We have had rabbits for several years but are just starting into meat rabbits. I have butchered twice and it gets easier and faster everytime, there really is not much of a learning curve to it. Go for it I say.


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## collector (Feb 22, 2011)

KrystalMarie said:
			
		

> 150# seems a pretty conservative number should be fine. I prsonally wouldnt breed more agressivly than that. You need to give the doe time to wean the kitts and gain her health back for  a couple weeks before kindling again. Rabbit meat is IMO better than chicken it will absorb the flavors of the spices that you use better than chicken. I also prefer butchuring rabbits to chickens, for me it is quicker and cleaner. Dont worry about those cute little ears you cannot eat them anyway LOL. It took me 10 Yrs to convince my wife to get chickens, But now she acts like it was her idea. We have had rabbits for several years but are just starting into meat rabbits. I have butchered twice and it gets easier and faster everytime, there really is not much of a learning curve to it. Go for it I say.


OOOPS I was logged in on my daughters acount and did not realize it untill it was to late.


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## DianeS (Feb 22, 2011)

I also live in Colorado Springs, and you are correct that the city laws don't say anything about rabbits. Which means - there's no law against it! Just be reasonable, and don't exceed the nuisance laws - keep any noise, odor, and unsightliness away from the neighbors' senses. And there are laws affecting how/if you can sell animals from your property (and how many, how often, etc), but if you are raising them for your own consumption then those don't apply.

I have a buck and four (soon to be five) does. I keep them in individual hutches inside my over-large chicken run.

The chickens are really, really easy to care for. They don't smell, they make a little noise but not much, and they produce edibles every day. I'd recommend a small flock of chickens to almost anybody. 

The rabbits aren't so easy. They are silent animals, but the droppings DO smell, because I don't have a good sanitation system set up yet. The droppings fall to the ground and the chickens scatter them around. The urine soaks the straw on the ground and keeps the droppings damp.  I have to muck out the chicken run because of the rabbits. But I need the rabbits inside the run because the run is predator-proof, and of course there are raccoons and all sorts of predators in COS. You either predator-proof a chicken coop, chicken run, rabbit hutches, etc - or you don't have animals anymore. 

Of course once the droppings, urine, and wet straw are in the compost pile, they stop smelling and start breaking down. A good compost pile is probably a necessity for in-city rabbit raising. 

One thing I did before getting rabbits with the intention of breeding was to buy a couple young meat rabbits and process them all the way through. From live animal to dinner main course. I had to know I could do it, I had to know it wasn't overly time-consuming, and I had to know that I liked the taste! If you do that, you might have less concern about convincing anyone, because either they're OK with the process and taste or they aren't. 

Same thing with chickens - I bought two meat chickens and went through the whole processing experience wtih them, too. From live animal to dinner dish. For the same reasons. Chickens can get a variety of things wrong with them and I needed to be sure I could put one out of its misery, too. The chickens I have now are exclusively for eggs (at least until they get too old), but the knowledge is still important. 

As far as rabbits being "all white meat" - that depends on your definition of white meat. For one thing, it's dark. At least my rabbits are becasue they have plenty of room to run around and develop their muscles. But on the other hand, it has less fat than meats typically called "red meat" - the fat content is more in line with "white meat" - and in some cases there is less fat than even most white meats. So that's a definition thing. 

I feel like I'm rambling, but I hope this information helps!


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## tortoise (Feb 22, 2011)

DianeS is right about the poo mess.  The smelly part is the urine!  In a compost pile, the urine drains and you can get a steaming hot compost pile going!  (Wood chips or straw will dramatically slow it down)

I haad cages with plastic trays below.  I wash them every day in summer.  I also live in a neighborhood.

Our next door neighbor stopped over and complained when we got back from vacation.  Petsitter didn't clean out trays for a week!  I scrubbed everything down and the neighbor was happy.


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## dewey (Feb 22, 2011)

KrystalMarie said:
			
		

> 150# seems a pretty conservative number should be fine. I prsonally wouldnt breed more agressivly than that. You need to give the doe time to wean the kitts and gain her health back for  a couple weeks before kindling again. Rabbit meat is IMO better than chicken it will absorb the flavors of the spices that you use better than chicken. I also prefer butchuring rabbits to chickens, for me it is quicker and cleaner. Dont worry about those cute little ears you cannot eat them anyway LOL. It took me 10 Yrs to convince my wife to get chickens, But now she acts like it was her idea. We have had rabbits for several years but are just starting into meat rabbits. I have butchered twice and it gets easier and faster everytime, there really is not much of a learning curve to it. Go for it I say.


So true about the ears, lol, and couldn't agree more on how easy, clean, and quick rabbits are to process, especially compared to chickens.  I'm pretty sure my days of processing chickens/turkeys are over...never did care for the mess.  

I'd always figured roughly around 200# a year produced per doe, around 100 pounds dressed per doe, 5 litters per doe yearly, 39 day breedback schedule, so their not weaned, they're with the doe until processing.  Some others aim for more litters per year but I'm happy with 5.  

Myke, I hope your SO comes around.  Funny how some can eventually come around to the point of not even being able to imagine life before raising your own.


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## dewey (Feb 22, 2011)

Meat processed past the point of fryer age (beyond 8-12 weeks old) will have somewhat darker, coarser, less tender meat...but they're still delicious.  Anything over 12 weeks old was a stewer.


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## tortoise (Feb 22, 2011)

dewey said:
			
		

> Meat processed past the point of fryer age (beyond 8-12 weeks old) will have somewhat darker, coarser, less tender meat...but they're still delicious.  Anything over 12 weeks old was a stewer.


My breed is slower growing and I butcher more like 20 weeks.  The meat is very tender, but the connective tissue can be tough.  

I did cull one that was almost 2 years old - she went in the crockpot!


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## dewey (Feb 22, 2011)

tortoise said:
			
		

> dewey said:
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Yep!  Can't beat crocks and pressure cookers for stewers.  With lots of onion and garlic.


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## Myke (Feb 22, 2011)

Thanks for all the help. Butchering for me isn't a problem, I've got to where I can field dress a cottontail in under a minute, skinned, gutted, rinsed and in the cooler. I think I may try tanning a few hides so it will take a bit longer. I will check the grocery store and see if they carry rabbit, never seen it, but never looked either. It will be tough to get them to eat anything I cook, I've come home with deer, cottontail, wild pig, and snapping turtle, and planning to try rattlesnake this summer. I will give the store bought a try and hopefully I can cook ok, then I just need to make sure nobody starts naming them.
Myke


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## wYs Ranch (Feb 23, 2011)

Do you do any gardening?  Flower or food?  The rabbit droppings are cold compost, they can be put right on the plants.   And they don't smell.   So lots of free fertilizer!!  (pee is definatly the culprit for odors)  I currently have 10 mature rabbits and 9, 8 wk old kits in an enclosed shed.  It doesn't smell (although it is winter).  We pull out the trays and clean every saturday.   
Go ahead and let them name the breeding adults.  You'll have them around for a while!
I think the dom. rabbit has a very mild flavor.  Wild is far different.
Try a local butcher shop, they may have rabbit.  Most of the resturants or shops get rabbit shipped in from overseas.  You could also find someone else who raises meat rabbits and buy one local... either live or processed.
You can also tell your SO that rabbit is very lean and healty! It won't be injected with hormones or chemicals!   And, they'll know it was raised with care and humainly processed.


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## hoodat (Feb 23, 2011)

Rabbit is raised completely different from any other meat animal. You don't have the large unnatural and inhumane conditions of cattle feed lots or overcrowding such as in large chicken and pig operations. Rabbits cannot be overcrowded or force fed. They just up and die if it's tried. Those who try to make a big operation out of it almost invariably go broke.
Most rabbits are raised in small operations of ten or less breeding does by people that do it partly as a hobby and partly to make money. A buyer makes the rounds collecting the rabbits where they are taken to processing plants that are also smaller than slaughter houses for other animals. The result is a humane, clean operation that yields healthier and cleaner meat.


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## tortoise (Feb 23, 2011)

Myke said:
			
		

> then I just need to make sure nobody starts naming them.
> Myke


I label mine with the rabbit's name.  That way I can track the breeding and date of birth.  

My son is 3.  Every once in a while when I ask him what he wants for dinner, he will say a rabbit's name.  Usually a rabbit we have already eaten, lol.

We like to know our food.  We'll even name the deer in the freezer.  We ate from a mule deer for most of a year.  The head is mounted in my son's room.  After we would eat, he would run down the hall and say, "Thank you for dinner B.B.!"


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## dewey (Feb 23, 2011)

> The head is mounted in my son's room.  After we would eat, he would run down the hall and say, "Thank you for dinner B.B.!"


 That's precious, lol.


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## Mitransplant (Mar 5, 2011)

Question(s) from another newby.

I have heard that you can not breed siblings. Is this right? If so, how do you keep your "herds" going when the original two are two old?

By this I mean   Say I got three rabbits. Two does and one buck. Breed then for  ? amount of time and then they either die or are to old, I can't breed and start over with any of the kits, so would I have to get another few rabbits in a few years to replace these?  I have so many questions about raising rabbits that I am unsure if I can do it. 
My sister raised them in her garage in MI for years but I didn't care about it at the time. Now years later I am trying to find ways to add to the food supply so thought about raising rabbits to go along with the 40 chickens I have. I didn't think they would be that hard to raise and breed and don't take up much room.

The hardest part for me right now if finding someone around me that raises and sells them cheaply. Checked one rabbitry and she would sell me a rabbit for 45 bucks. I think that is rather high for a meat rabbit.  
Can I just get some of the ones they will have in the farm stores in a few weeks and use those?  Is it alright if they are related? I don't want any defects so need to know what I need to do.

Thanks for letting me ask these dumb questions but I really need to know some of the answers before getting rabbits.


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## Myke (Mar 5, 2011)

Mitransplant,
My wife's family is from the Bad Axe Port Austin area. I would recommend getting Storys' Guide to Raising Rabbits, I checked it out from the library, full of information. Other than that, I will have to let others with more experience than me answer those questions. I'm still in the planning stage myself. Good Luck
Myke


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## Myke (Mar 5, 2011)

I found rabbit for sale at 2 locations here in Colorado Springs. Andy's Meat Market wanted $8 a pound, went to Rancho Librio and once I was able to remember conejo  from high school Spanish, I found it for $4 a pound. Slow cooked it last night and made a pot of Rabbit and Dumplings for dinner tonight. Wife and both daughters said it was very good. I still foresee troubles when they see little balls of fur hopping around in a cage though.


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