My wife grew up having chicken noodle soup that was actually rabbit noodle soup. She didn’t know until she was older and thought it was good. Domesticated rabbit is similar to the dark meat on chicken. Many who will contest this likely grew up eating hunted rabbits, which are significantly tougher, both because they’re usually older, and they’re more used to running around, so they’re more lean and more muscled, making it tougher.
Rabbits make for a decent and renewable food source. One person went from 4 (2 breeding pairs) to 19 in two weeks.
Tips for Their Cages:
You want it dry and out of the wind if possible. They handle cold pretty well. In cold weather, make sure their water doesn’t freeze over. You’ll want an enclosed cage. Predators can come from the ground or from the air in the form of owls or hawks. Because of this you’ll want to make sure that you have fencing on all sides, including the top.
If you’re building your own permanent cage, be sure to lay fencing down on the ground and put a foot of dirt on top of it. Rabbits like to burrow, but you also don’t want them to escape, or open holes for predators to get in. Rabbits like straw. They burrow inside of it, keeping them warm and making them feel safe.
You can also just buy a hutch premade. This option can be used indoors or outdoors. It’s sturdy and is the most popular choice on Amazon. It also comes in a few different color options. I prefer to just build my own things when I can, but for the price, it’d be hard to just get materials for the cost of this hutch. Add in the time to build, and it may be cheaper to just buy one if you don’t have a custom plan in mind.
People can get pretty creative with raising rabbits. I’ve seen reports of people raising rabbits in a shed, a barn stall, and even a room in their home, though they laid down rubber first on the floor. A rabbit can have babies 5-8 times per year, and sometimes more.
Food
You can buy rabbit feed from a variety of sources. A lot of people also supplement rabbit food with natural vegetation. In the video below for example they have their rabbits in a cage with a mesh bottom and they move them to a new patch of grass every day. Others will give older produce to rabbits. Don’t give them anything rotten, but they don’t mind if things are a little bit wilted.
Challenges
Be careful of disease. Tularemia is a real danger. Don’t let them mix with other critters and you can mitigate this risk. Many people who farm their own rabbits will keep dogs to keep other animals away.
Rabbits can kill each other. Homesteady, in their video (above) thinks this is due to rabbits starting to reach maturity and getting more frisky with smaller rabbits who can’t handle it yet.
Consider having more than one cage or colony of rabbits, separated from each other. If one rabbit enclosure has a predator problem, you don’t want your food source to just be gone. You’ll be able to rebuild your rabbit stock. It’s also good to be aware of neighbors or others in your community who raise rabbits.
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The first snare I set for a rabbit didn’t catch anything. I was about 10 and had rigged a slip knot with some bailing twine and set it on a game trail. I didn’t know if rabbits used the game trail, but it seemed like a good spot…. READ MORE
