The Fat Ewe Farm and Bed and Breakfast
The Fat Ewe Farm and Moose Hills Inn
Organic Permaculture Farmin' for
the Lazy Ewes
  • The Fat Ewe Farm
  • About Us
  • Blog
  • The Fat Ewe Farm Store
  • Livestock Breeds (click here to see all the breeds)
    • Angora goats
    • Icelandic Sheep
    • Jacob sheep
    • Old English Southdown Babydoll Sheep >
      • Babydoll Sheep on the Fat Ewe Farm
  • Contact Us
    • Photo Gallery (click here for some awesome photos or watch the slideshow) >
      • Video Slide Show
    • Phone Number
    • Map
  • Sale Barn
  • Recipes From the Fat Ewe
    • Old Stuff
  • How Much Meat Do You Get?
  • Ukrainian Easter Eggs
  • Moose Hills Inn

Raising Rabbits

2/2/2015

0 Comments

 
Picture
Rabbits in the brine
Picture
freshly butchered rabbit being washed and parted
One of the projects with being self sustaining in mind, is raising rabbits for food. Rabbits are so cute and personable, but then so are pigs, sheep, and yes, even cows. Raising any animal for food is a hard thing to do - to cage or contain the animal knowing that at the end of their lives they will have to face being killed for my sake. 

I felt that way about the rabbits and prolonged their deaths until they outgrew their cages. Then they had to go. I tried to sell them, but there were no takers, so the only option that was left was to butcher them. I could not kill them though. Every day I handled them, petted them, watched them and kiilling them simply was out of the question. My friend volunteered to come and dispatch them for me and in return, though not much pay, I offered a rabbit to him. He was ready to accept the rabbit, a prime breeding buck, however; the wife was not interested in raising rabbits. In the end they took the rabbit home butchered instead. 

That left four rabbits for me. I brined them overnight and then next day drained the brine and froze three and half of them, and cooked the rest of one in the crock pot. The aroma of the rabbit filled the little farmhouse with the tempting smells of deliciousness. And when it was ready, the rabbit was tender and full of the most amazing flavour, moist and absolutely delightful. The taste and texture was incredible and that changed my mind about raising little bunnies for food right then and there. The rabbits I have are Flemish Giants and the largest at 5 months, dressed out at 16 pounds and the lightest at 12, still very large. The rabbits are a very big breed and the buck I have is imported from Holland. This summer I will breed the does several times and then keep all the rabbits for meat. Perhaps I might be able to manage 50 rabbits for the year, one a week. 

The rabbits started out being fed rabbit pellets, but I wanted to know what ingredients were used to manufacture the pellets. The rabbits ate them readily and did not want any other food. Slowly I switched them over to a mix of grains: whole oats, barley, wheat and field peas, plus they got alfalfa and hay for roughage. I will not feed pellets again becuase when I finally did discover the ingredients, there were ingredients that I prefer not to eat. Canola meal was first, but they also included corn and soy, all GMO crops. 

The housing for the rabbits was problematic. I do not have real rabbit cages, so I put the babies in dog kennels and for the winter surrounded the kennels with straw bales to keep the rabbits warm. The two does live in a 5 foot by 7 kennel divided in half and they each have two straw bales to create dens in. The male rabbit lives in a hutch with a special box filled with straw inside the hutch to keep him from freezing. I am still not sure that is warm enough though. For the summer, when there are lots of babies, I have been buying cribs and wire panels from stores. The cribs are easy to convert to a two rabbit cage and they can be had for around 25 dollars each. A proper cage costs about 60 dollars per rabbit. Dishes can be made from tin cans and water dishes from plastic pop bottles. In winter the water bowls need to be rubber so the ice can be hanmmerd out without injuring the bowls. The babies should be full grown by winter though and only the breeding stock will be kept over the winter. 

Have you ever had a roast farm rabbit? You should try it !
Picture
0 Comments

Your comment will be posted after it is approved.


Leave a Reply.

    Categories

    All
    Airstream Land Yacht 1964
    Alpacas
    Alpine Goats
    Ameraucana Chickens
    American Buff Geese
    Ancona Ducks
    Angora Goats
    Angora Goats
    Angora Rabbits.
    Babydoll Southdown Sheep
    Babydoll Southdown Sheep
    Bed And Breakfast
    Berkshire Pigs
    Blue Faced Leicester Sheep
    Blue Swedish Ducks
    Boer Goats
    Border Collie
    Border Collie
    Bronze Turkey Standard
    Bronze Turkey (Standard)
    Canadian Horses
    Canadian Horses
    Cats
    Chickens
    Cotswold Sheep
    Crafts And Hobbies
    Cream Legbar Chickens
    Dorset Sheep
    Ducks
    Embden Geese
    E'st A Laine Merino Sheep
    Farm Life
    Farm Life
    Farm Store
    Finnsheep
    Flemish Giant Rabbit
    Flowers
    French Lop Rabbit
    Galloway Cattles
    Gardening
    Gotland Sheep
    Guinea Fowl
    Herbs
    Holstein Steer
    Icelandic Sheep
    Jacob Sheep
    Japanese Bantam Chickens
    Jersey Cow
    Kahaki Campbell Ducks
    Karakul Sheep
    Kiko Goats
    Kilo Highland Cows
    Light Sussex Chicken
    Livestock Guardian Dogs
    Livestock Guardian Dogs
    Maremma Sheepdogs
    Maremma Sheepdogs
    Meishan Pigs
    Miniature Nigerian Dwarf Goats
    Moose Hills Inn
    Muscovy Ducks
    Norwegian Red Dairy Cow
    Nubian Goats
    Nygora Goat
    Ossabaw Hogs
    Partidge Chantecler Chickens
    Pekin Ducks
    Permaculture
    Pied Guinea Fowl
    Polish/Ameraucana Bantam Cross Chickens
    Polled Dorset Sheep
    Potbelly Pigs
    Pygmy Goats
    Recipes
    Rigit Galloway Cows.
    Romanov Sheep
    Romney Sheep
    Rouen Ducks
    Saddleback Pomeranican Geese
    Saxony Ducks
    Sebastopol Geese
    Sheep And Goats
    Shetland Sheep
    Silver Spangled Hamburg Chicken
    Soap And Hand Made Cosmetics
    Standard Jack Donkey
    Sustainability
    Swiss Blackneck Goats
    The Llamas
    The Llamas
    Toulouse Geese
    Tunis Sheep
    White Chantecler Chickens
    White Danish Geese
    Wool

    Author

    Fluffy writes daily about the experiences on the farm and with the bed and breakfast patrons. 

    Archives

    October 2020
    September 2019
    June 2019
    March 2019
    January 2019
    November 2018
    December 2017
    November 2017
    October 2017
    September 2017
    August 2017
    July 2017
    June 2017
    May 2017
    April 2017
    March 2017
    February 2017
    January 2017
    December 2016
    November 2016
    October 2016
    September 2016
    August 2016
    July 2016
    June 2016
    May 2016
    April 2016
    March 2016
    February 2016
    January 2016
    December 2015
    November 2015
    October 2015
    September 2015
    August 2015
    July 2015
    June 2015
    May 2015
    April 2015
    March 2015
    February 2015
    January 2015
    December 2014
    November 2014
    October 2014
    September 2014
    August 2014
    July 2014
    June 2014
    May 2014
    April 2014
    March 2014
    February 2014
    January 2014
    December 2013
    November 2013
    October 2013
    September 2013
    August 2013
    July 2013
    June 2013
    May 2013
    April 2013
    March 2013
    February 2013
    January 2013

    view old blog site

    RSS Feed

Contact Us
Home

The Fat Ewe Farm 

All text and photos are the sole property of The Fat Ewe Farm  and may not be used without written permission.