Butchering at least 4 this morning

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ollitos

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It's exciting to finally be a the point that we are ready to harvest our rabbits.
 
Yes. I have got impatient and started getting them at under 5 lbs. I'm trying to contain myself.
 
Butchered four. Live weights were 5, 5, 4 13 and 4 15. Dressed weights 3, 3, 2.75 and 2.95. That's pretty consistent!
 
Those are good, solid numbers! :D

It took us forever our first time... we did six. That was just about two years ago, come to think of it.
 
The smaller ones were 11 weeks. The others were 12 or 13 weeks.

We were done butchering and cleaning in about an hour.
 
I'm anxious to butcher a couple too. Mine will be 12 weeks July 18th and I'm trying to hold back. I have some that weigh in at 4 lbs.... think I'll go weigh again!! ;)
 
Broom method but with a stick.

When we butcher, we keep the belly meat, heart, kidneys and liver for our customer.

Greg kills the rabbit and does the skinning. I clean the organs, chill the rabbit and trim off the fat. I weigh the butchered rabbit with organs and put it in the bag for aging in the freezer. I mark each bag with the date and finished weight. Our process works well because by the time I'm done cleaning and trimming and packing, he's almost ready to take the next rabbit off the hanger.
 
Sounds like a nice process! :D We took 2 hours to do 6 rabbits our first time! :oops: AND we missed the chest cavity on the first couple, and had to go back to remove the heart and lungs.

ILoveBunnies kills the rabbit, waits for movement to stop, and then hangs it. She sometimes has time to start skinning the legs, if I'm not finished with the previous rabbit. Then I take the rabbit and skin it. My mom takes the rabbits I've put in the tray inside to Shay, who cleans them and sets the giblets aside. Mom packages the rabbits and puts them in the fridge to age. When we're all finished, I come inside and clean all the giblets.

I seem to recall our most recent time taking about 45 minutes for 6 rabbits, not including cleanup and giblets. Much better. :) With 4 on the assembly line, it really helps!

ollitos":8i21mjvd said:
put it in the bag for aging in the freezer
You do mean fridge? It won't age in the freezer...
 
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