Trapping bunnies

So I am gonna be cheap on this one but I decided to trap bunnies instead of buying rabbits off of any body else. (the rabbits are slim picking around here) Where I live we have cottontails. Has anyone else tried to do this if so how did it work? This will be cheaper than going and buying rabbits from the store. And breeding will already be a habit, and I have some good spots for catching good young ones. Would they be hard to tame?

Depending on were you live, it may be illegal to keep cottontail. You will need to check the wildlife regulations in your area. If you are allowed to keep them you will often be limited to how many you can keep. Even if you can get past all this, Cottontails are notoriously hard to keep alive in captivity and they are much smaller than meat bred European rabbits. I really don't think you'd get much back for your effort.

Ok thanks! I do have a lop and a Rex that I got from murdochs is that a good choice or not?

Personally I prefer NZWs. Mainly because they are easy to find and cheap to buy. In my area you can get a good quality one for $10-$15. Wild rabbits don't do well in captivity. Most will die of a heart attack while still in the live trap, if it is still alive when you get there, just moving it to a cage could push it over the edge.

Now, given it's legal, and you get it in a cage and it's still alive, moving the doe around to be breed, for weight checks, or overall check ups could kill it. If not, then the rabbit will shred you arms and chest. Also she will be a high risk for abandoning her kits after you do a check on them. Overall she/he won't no why or what is going on and will live every second, in your rabbity, in fear. And that is not ethical.Commercial rabbits are not breed to be cuddle buns but will be able to handle the daily activities without killing over or shredding you to pieces. Plus if bought young will get use to you and the daily activities and look forward to seeing you.

Plus wild rabbit is tougher, leaner, and has a slight gamy flavor. Which might be able to be breed out but the time and expense would be very costly.

Just my thoughts,
Cathy

Cathy has said it well
It is absolutely illegal here, where I live.
They are wild animals and simply not the same as domesticated, farm bred rabbits.
For your results, it probably will not be cheaper (you can pick up a meat mutt off of any online classifieds for $5), and it is definitely not ethical.

I think crossing a lop(any kind other than holland) and a rex(even a mini) together for meat mutts would be much better than attempting to trap wild cottontails, which are not even the same specifics as our domestic European rabbits.

Wild eastern cottontails can weigh between 1.8 and 4.4 lbs, according to Wikipedia.

Most of us butcher domestic rabbits at 5 lbs. Most adult meat animals are in the 10 lbs range.

In other words, at two months old most domestic rabbits of any breed are larger than adult cottontails.

I think, even if you could get cottontails to successfully breed in captivity, there would be little return for the effort.

Forget it Oscar.

1. It's illegal in Colorado

2. You will NEVER tame a cottontail

3. It will not live

4. You will have the D.O.W. on your back

:yeahthat:

Even if they survived capture I doubt you'd get a wild caught adult to eat hay, grains or accept pellets as food

Where have you looked for rabbits?

Many meat breeders don't advertise publicly for fear of animal rights Nutjobs harassing them.

Try posting a wanted ad, contact your local 4H or agricultural society or even ask your feed store to pass along your email/phone # to the people who buy rabbit pellets in bulk

Placing your location would be a huge help to us, that way we can help you better.

"Help us to help you" :lol: :lol:

There might be a RTer in your area that can help you out. The 2 that are closest to me have been a fountain of information. They might even have stock for sale.

wamplercathy":2w8bdnh3 said:

Placing your location would be a huge help to us, that way we can help you better.

Click to expand...

Oscar is in Montrose Colorado. Pretty small town in the high country in western CO. You drive 100 miles to get anywhere and you're still in a small town when you arrive. :lol: Beautiful country but just not much around that part of the state. I'm probably the closest R/T member right now. I've never seen another member from up there.

Interesting factoid:
All the domestic rabbit breeds have 22 chromosome pairs, cottontails have 21 pairs, and hares have 24. None of these can be cross bred (pregnancies spontaneously terminate within hours) so there's no way to breed out cottontails' undesirable qualities. (Rabbit Production, 8th Ed., McNitt)

I would contact your local 4H extension office. Somewhere there is a 4Her who needs to cover his feed costs.

IF you still want to do this in defiance of local law, your best bet would be to find a nest of very young that you can dropper feed or capture them as small as you can. An adult rabbit will never tame for you, will attack whenever you corner it for breeding, kill its kits to keep you from them, and likely kill itself trying to escape.

Thank you for all of you advise my friend found a small cottontail outside of her house and named it thumper she took it everywhere with her to much everywhere and she fed it puppy formula which wasn't the best choice and it died. If I did have a little nest of babies what would I feed them?

If you find a nest of baby cottontails, please leave it alone.

Don't imagine that they are abandoned just because you don't see the mother tending them. Being prey animals, they protect their babies by hiding them, only going to them to feed them once or twice a day -- usually dawn and dusk.

If you want wild rabbit for meat, get a gun and a hunting licence.

a lop crossed with a rex will make a decent meat rabbit... depends on the size and type of each.. you'll either get a meat rabbit sized rabbit, or a small meat type rabbit.

I've done holland lop-mini rex.. you get a decent small rabbit good for single meals or soup. Some get big enough to make two meals.

For wild coottontail nestlings, the common bacteria found on human hands can be fatal.

Every now and then someone loses a litter of domestic kits to kids with unwashed hands too.
That is because there are strains of e coli found on some people's skin (particularly children's) that humans and adult rabbits can tolerate, but newborn bunnies sometimes cannot.

Well, I did trap 2 wild rabbits years ago, before I started with bunnies, but even being european rabbits they would always be stressed out in a cage and would always try to escape, with no regard to their safty and health. They are wild animals, unable to grasp the concept of a cage being their whole world.

I had a litter sired by a wild rabbit (caught that guy and set him free 10km away), even the offspring was different. Coping with close quarters and being not scared of humans is a for centuries bred in trait of our domestic rabbits, Sold one of these does to a farmer who wanted to repopulate his farm with wild rabbits but had already two wild rabbits (bred in captivity by an expert) die on him, so he was happy to try the half wild doe.

I'm pretty sure Cottontails are much less suitable as lifestock or pets, like hares they do not live in burrows, so there most likly is very little tolerance for close quarters. And even kits that seem to be docile will get skittish and wild when they grow up - as far as I know Cottontails don't live in groups or colonies, so no genetic disposition for friendly social behaviour.

Anyway, they are pretty much useless for meat, you can't show them, they will never be pets, and so on.

Better try to find a way to get rabbits of a breed that suits your plans transported to you, isn't there some kind of platform where private people offer to transport stuff on trips they do anyway for a reasonable fee?

SoDak Thriver":zi7273w2 said:

Interesting factoid:
All the domestic rabbit breeds have 22 chromosome pairs, cottontails have 21 pairs, and hares have 24. None of these can be cross bred (pregnancies spontaneously terminate within hours) so there's no way to breed out cottontails' undesirable qualities. (Rabbit Production, 8th Ed., McNitt)

Click to expand...

But domestication is possible. Just unlikely and the cost would be too high, to both you and the rabbit.

-- Sat Dec 05, 2015 8:54 am --

Just did a quick search through craigslist and came up with this:
http://westslope.craigslist.org/grd/5339743802.html

$10 each and only 25 miles from where Homer said you might be located (Montrose, Colorado). They are located in the Delta, CO area.

Or:
http://westslope.craigslist.org/grd/5332266589.html

There are several that are about an hours drive. The person I bought my rabbits from is about that far from me. Sometimes a drive is worth it though. I only looked through the farm section of craigslist you could also try the pet section too.

Sometimes you just have to be patient. In Spring Craigslist ought to explode with rabbits It would be cruel to confine cotton tails. Patience and I realize that word and rabbits does not go well together haha.

So much for the phrase breed like rabbits right! :evil: I want babies!!! :? I'll probably get another doe mini lop from Murdochs next spring. The real question is can I wait that long?

I sat and watched a doe and buck cuddle for 3 hours. It was sickening. :lol: :lol: