Demamma
Well-known member
On Friday I taught and helped someone butcher 10 of their rabbits and I butchered out 6 of my own. Decided on Monday to do a few more. I had a English Lop who we call the jerk. He escaped his cage and we just let him be. He liked to chase my standard poodle who then would chase him. He also liked to head butt me when I was working in the rabbitry. When in a cage he would try to scratch and try to pee on me. I was glad to butcher the jerk rabbit out. I also had to butcher my older Champagne D'Argent buck. He had sore hocks that were not healing. He was not interested in breeding then he got some abscesses on the side of his foot. I never realized how hard it is to kill and butcher a full grown buck. Oh my gosh it's hard. My champagne' s neck was super thick so using the wringer was tough. When I went to skinning him he sure did not want to part with his hide. I finally got his hide off and then it went easy. When I finished the bucks I took care of some young fryer rabbits. I was so tired yesterday I got a bit dehydrated. The good news is.......all the rabbits looked great inside. All the liver, hearts and lungs looked great. I always feel good about the health of my herd when I butcher. When I was in the middle of butchering a worker started cleaning up the yard next to me. He was able to see everything but he was ok with it. The house was abandoned and is now bank owned. I talked to the worker and since he was cleaning up the yard he gave me a bunch of 2x4's he was cleaning up. I gave him a rabbit out of the freezer to take home. He was interested in the rabbits for meat so I gave him a tour of the rabbitry and told him about raising for meat. He asked a lot of good questions and I showed him examples of good meat rabbits and what to look for. He said he will probably come back to me in the future to get some meat breeders. I was in the middle of butchering and he asked to watch so I showed him what to do. It feels good to be able to teach others about meat rabbits. Looking into the bottom of my fridge and seeing all the meat is great also. The kids and I have enough rabbit to last quite a while and about 15 more to process in a few weeks. Next I am going to try my hand at tanning hides.
