Is THIS The Next Big Farm Craze? - Meat Rabbits On Pasture
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- Опубликовано: 16 мар 2023
- Is THIS The Next Big Farm Craze? - Meat Rabbits On Pasture
Today we are moving our meat rabbits out on pasture. These are bunnies that are being weaned off their moms and ready to start on the grass.
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I've been raising rabbit colonies for 3 years now and it blows my mind that more folks don't raise rabbit and they aren't on more dinner tables
This is our 4th season and I can't believe it took us so long.
Been doin' about 100 growouts a year (2 a week for the dinner table)
Rabbit eggs are a lot smaller than chicken eggs and taste funny.
I was never a fan of the rabbit raisons either
Lol
I can never eat Cocoa Puffs again...
They taste just fine just like fish eggs
😂😂
Rabbits were the first animal on our farm for a number of reasons they are awesome. Their poop is a cold manure, taste better than chicken, better nutrition as the meat is identical to chicken except rabbit has vitamin B6, can produce an insane amount of meat, can be processed X3 faster than a chicken and they are a very clean animal. Love rabbits highly recommend them
Cuteness factor is right! We raised our first batch, my husband (life long hunter), processed them. Next batch of babies come along, get old enough to process but it’s not happening. Finally I ask him what’s the deal & he admits he just doesn’t want to kill ‘em..they’re too cute. That was the end of our rabbit venture!
That goes with most animals you raise - it is hard to kill them - so build yourself a pond and stock it with fish - they are easy to kill and provide protein -
I always let mine get too big before I can bring myself to kill them.
So glad to hear that.
Yeah...a live bunny is the best.
You may not be hungry enough if you cant harvest the meat. Aren't deer cute? I love deer meat.
We cut off the easy meat and grind it with pig fat back to make our own rabbit sausage. Taste great and not too dry with the pig fat. We feed the bones and leftover meat to the pigs and chickens, they love it 😊.
Its good to give the bunnies just a tiny bit of grass the first times they try it.
Can have problems if stomachs are not ready or it.
I've been doing rabbits, pigs and chickens for years. Breakfast sausage, brats with rabbit added to pork is amazing. Lots more to do than just a rabbit dinner. Have fun and eat good folks
Our rabbits in the rabbit tractor drink very little water. They seem to get most of their moisture from plants, and it is amazing how fast they can clear an 8 x 8 patch!
I was stationed in Calif. I the early 50s and you could buy rabbit in the super markets!
They sure seemed to be a lot easier to move than those pigs were! ;)
I really enjoyed having meat rabbits. Little to no noise, good quality meat, fast reproduction and growth rates, tons of (almost) ready to use fertilizer, low odor. and did I mention they are QUIET? 😂 Rabbits are so quiet and low-odor that they work well in suburban areas.
Rabbit manure is considered "cold" or plant ready immediately. Simply collects and spread on your garden, will not burn plants.
Just got my first 3 and live in a semi rural/ suburban on a small lot. Container garden and rabbits 🐇 and of course dogs. We have mountain lions and coyotes that take pets and livestock
Thank you, I have been saying for years that rabbits are easy to raise and a great start to any homestead.
FYI been raising rabbits for few years now and boy do they love chewing on that nice new wood on the inside of them tractors. Rabbits are a must on a small homestead👍👍
We raised Rex rabbits, colony style, for meat and fur. They loved living in a colony. They formed friendships and enjoyed being able to run, dig, and jump around.
Unfortunately, they did contract RHDV2, and we were ordered by the state to cull the entire herd. This was way back when it first showed up in our area, and they were still trying to keep it from spreading. Nowadays, they don't require you to cull anymore. It's considered endemic now.
We're actually thinking about getting back into rabbits soon. They were super easy to raise and process and made for good shredded "chicken".
My brother raised the rabbits but couldn't face the processing or knowing when we ate them so mom would say 4 legged chicken!
Those panels make nice light tops but they are wind catchers. We put tires on top. Finish meat rabbits in tractors. Keep future breeders off the ground to eliminate parasites. Slats tend to flatten grass unless you have 2 people to move them. Wire works just fine and you get an even mow.
Pretty close to how we run our grow outs. Winters are nasty here, so we only breed our stock 3 times per year. But then, we are breeding nearly 2 dozen does at a time. About one third of our hay field is set aside to run the grow out pens across. With our numbers, we have to move them at least twice a day, sometimes as much as 4 times as the growing season comes to a close each year. We are running a mix of Rex, and Flemish giants.
Have thought about flemish. How is the bone to meat ratio and grow out weeks?
Are you feeding a large family plus selling? Do you get a decent rate if you sell the meat?
One way to help prevent falling into the cuteness trap...they are RABBITS, not "bunnies."
Breed back 2 weeks after kindling. That usually gives mom a 2 week break between litters.
4 legged chickens!
@@conniehawkins9459 Actually, they are 'underground chickens'.
First time I had rabbit was at a game dinner. Wonderful. That guy knew how to cook
Such great content. Pigs, chicken, cows, bunnies, turkeys…I love it all!
Proper Rabbit husbandry says to secure a rabbits rear legs, their kicks are powerful enough to break their own backs if not supported.
Hey there.
Could you please put a box in them pens for the rabbits to take cover from wind and sun and to hide when something frightens them?
My aunt had three of her meat rabbits die of heart attack when a dog came into the yard a was running around their pen.
We raised rabbits for pets for about 10 years, some things we noted is they are less docile if they're unable to stand fully with ears extended.
And if board they'll cut their teath on wood, our's would wild graze in a fenced in area. Their coats are much softer when fed on vegetation rather than feed.
Doing this. Works great. Be mindful they will be more susceptible to mites or worms.
Helps to lime your soil and add DE to their grain if you offer any.
We raise meat rabbits, selling some kits. We run our rabbits in separate chicken tractors with wire on the bottom and cage wire like you have on the sides and tops. After we breed the does we keep them inside the rabbit house until they are weaned then the does go outside in the tractors. Helps keep the feed costs down, we only care for them every other day, much easier than any other animal we have raised.
In the 80's I fell for the you can get rich raising rabbits... Never again. No market for them in the local area.
This video is so wholesome it just about made my teeth hurt. Too sweet! 🐇 Dispatch day with rabbits is really tough for me. Processing is a snap compared to chickens!! Cornish cross are pretty easy. They just get intolerable by 9 weeks 😂 Thanks for showcasing the "unsung protein". The fertilizer is unmatched.
“Intolerable by 9 weeks”. I literally about snorted coffee out my nose! No truer words have ever been spoken.
I’ve wasted a million buck$… and wasted hundreds of hours and years. I never harvested a single one 😕 I raised em’ to produce food for a STF situation…
I just don’t have the heart to harvest them.
I’ll just stick with my chickens
(I don’t harvest them either) I’ve got wildlife to eat and have eggs of course.
Kits 2 weeks old then rebreed.. ween at 5 weeks that gives the doe 1 week to get ready to make another nest. Works great for me
The wooden floor may eventually rot/ mold from the wetness along with the urine from the rabbits. The thin wire you use to protect the rabbits, may not be strong enough to stop racoons, foxes, etc.
Kept California rabbits for a while. Great rabbits and excellent on the table. I was subject to travel for work back then and being on the road 3 or 4 days a week made it a bit rough to keep up with. Between what I ate myself and the people constantly begging for processed meat, I couldn't keep enough of them.
Chuck the feed conversion is as good as any chicken in my opinion. They are a whole lot easier to process. I raised New Zealand Whites and Californians for years. I enjoyed raising them and they produce the best fertilizer. Chicken wire will not even slow down a dog or other predators so be careful of that. Maybe run a hot wire around the outside of the cage area.
100% agree about the processing!
I agree totally! Fast growth, processing, feed conversion etc. Is so much better than chicken. We love our rabbits.
😅
What good is feed conversion if you starve to death eating rabbit?
@@PFirefly06 Rabbit starvation is only a factor if you only eat wild rabbit as your total diet with no added fat of any kind, because it is lean meat. If you only ate roasted, boneless, skinless chicken breast you would likely be in the same boat. Most Americans get plenty of added fat in their diet.
They’re so precious!!! Bun buns 🐰
We need to selectively breed a type of rabbit that is incedibly ugly. I agree with everything you said, although i think rabbit meat should replace beef, not chicken. The problem is they are cute.
I had rabbits for fun and food. They multiplied so fast that I couldn’t keep up with it. Ended up giving everyone I could free bunnies. Totally true they are much easier and faster than chickens. Other than the egg benefit. The thing bad about chickens is you only get babies of your hen wants to set. I have two rabbits a doe and a buck. They will be put to use making babies if we need them to eat but until I really need the meat they are just pets. The two will stay pets but their babies will be food. Will not breed them unless totally necessary. Good luck everyone. Thank you for your information. 😊
Well done . Informative 👍👍👍. Thank you for sharing. Be safe🇨🇦
Very informative video thanks for sharing God bless you and yours.
I love rabbit meat. I thought I'd just keep rabbits in case of emergency but they're so good I'm breeding often to replace chicken in my diet :)
Meat is tender and sweet at 12 weeks. Not as lean as I'd been worried about, and the liver and kidneys are super nutritious. I'm in the city so can't do a tractor, but the mulberry tree in my yard provides 50% of their food for free. They're nice and quiet so my neighbors don't even notice my mini farm! Lol. I couldn't do chickens or ducks without my neighbors shutting me down.
Just one trees leaves is fodder for how many rabbits? You think I should plant 3-4 white mulberry if I plan to have rabbits in the future? I'm in the city too.
@@-whackd I have one big, mature tree that supplies me with more than enough fodder to fatten up 12 rabbits at a time and feed my 3 adult breeding stock. I also feed grass and weeds from my yard. Today my bunnies got carrot tops, pea greens, sunflower leaves and mulberry leaves.
I'd get just 2 trees if you aren't a big mulberry lover, the fruit doesn't store well. One male and one female will guarantee you'll get berries. But it's totally up to you and your tastes in fruit. There are other trees that can feed rabbits, too.
Yall are the best and we love your videos. The diversity of livestock you tend is awesome. I'm interested in a few does and a buck to add new genes to our rabbits. Got a small homestead with my wife and 4 children who take on all the rabbit chores. They'd love to get some bunny's from yall. Hope the new place is all ya hoped it would be, seems wonderful from here.
Great video.
Bunny's are so cute.
I have the larger welded wire fencing, 2''x4'' i believe underneath my rabbit tractor and the it works out well.
Very informative!
Great video
Great video 🐇
Great content 👍
I do the same thing. I only have 1 tractor, but it's wider like 6x8. I also built a little ledge with a private area so they could get some rest or away from whatever was harassing them. I need to do a 5 gallon nipple feeder. Right now I use 2 black rubber bowls for water. They work ok, but the 5 gal would work better. We usually run 10 or so growouts in it.
Remember my family did this back in the 70’s, I was just 5 yo. They free ranged with the chickens, until they were requested to come to supper.
Nice think about rabbits is they don't bark or crow.😅
Yep. They are vewy vewy qwiet! (In my best Elmer Fudd voice). 😆😆
Really liked the music in this episode
Yes, you can breed does back when babies are 4 weeks old I typically water till babies are 5 to 6 weeks
Is Rabbit Math just like Chicken Math? 😎😜😇 Tim in northern TN
Similar!! 😆
Multiplication happens at an exponential rate if you let it! It gets out of hand very easily.
My daughters teacher gave her what was suppose to be two females. One ended up being a male. We went from two to 253 in no time we did take in 8. Rabbits are cute but I still think baby pigs are the cutest. I really like the pin
I had a rabbit on the ground later she was covered in bugs, bugs in her ears, she looked sick. I got her well later. There up high now.
look like australian cattle dogs one ble and one red in our terms, very smart good working dogs.
The #1 problem with rabbits is they are so cute and sweet they are so hard to cull. I definitely wouldn't have started with rabbits if I could do it again. I would start with chickens.
You should look up the SARA info on pastured rabbits. Forgot the woman's name but she use to run them a lot like they do chickens in califorina. In big masses on pasture with overhead protection. Also, for the side blockers you can get belts use for gravel crunching for cheap. Dead useful for all kinds of things but the side of the pens. You can run a lot more of them at a higher rate. Just remember to move a through faster and you can't leave it sitting. Works on guinea pigs as well. if you have a pervuian restaurant near you.
I don't like the slatted bottoms. I don't know a way around it. I think maybe a 1x4 laid flat all the way around the bottom and screwed in would keep them far enough from the edge to dig out. Except for the bottom I love it!
I put cage wire on the bottom of mine. Never had a problem with the rabbits stopping eating the grass as the video mentions.
Have plans to get some meat rabbits for myself !
We keep ours on pasture. Our tractors are super heavy so we will eventually build smaller more efficient setups
We just built our first Harepen! Id love to hear about how you help with ticks/mites
My dad and brother used to go out rabbit hunting and I remember them being scrawny little critters compared to a chicken
Domesticated rabbits are bigger and meatier than what you were remembering. And they are much easier/faster to harvest and process.
wild rabbit would be, but modern meat breeds are huge.
I've hunted wild rabbits (in my back yard...but I have a big back yard and tons of rabbits). You really have to stew them.
My dad raised giants something can't remember but after the last one was dispatched for food he was done couldn't handle the cries from them said it was like killing a person the sounds they make
We started doing our finisher rabbits all male runs all female runs in the Julie Engel system. Once setup it's a lot less work. A lot like how we do chicken in California. in bigger houses instead of the Joel Salatin way.
"J.W." - I haven't heard that since I was a kid.
My Mom and Grandpa called me that in grade school.
(Jason Wayne)
I would love to start raising meat rabbits but have not found breading stock yet in NE Ks. How could I get in touch with you? Are you in the Midwest?
I did this in my back yard.
Great idea
I hope it takes a long time before they come out with the rabbit flue.
Hahaha 🤣😂😆😂
I love meat rabbits But I don't see them ever replacing chickens as far as the role that they play on a homestead. They are a great addition to have on the homestead for many reasons but not necessarily something that would replace poultry.
We did Abbotsford a few years back, we couldn't convince the k8ds it was chicken. They could tell the textural difference and didn't like it. It isna great, easy, fast source of protein for sure though
I got rabbits last year and chickens this year lol. Guess I'm doing thing's backwards...
I don't know I bought 4 does and out of them only 1 took care of their babies after multiple liters and bags of feed.
Chickens for eggs I think is a better option.
The Hens are going to lay eggs and all you have to do is pick them up and cook no mess .
If you get a hen that wants to brood the eggs once the chicks hatch out they pretty much can take care of themselves. Can put the hen in the pot the same day if you want.
My first two animals will be chickens and rabbits. Just need to find the property 😊
I initially thought of rabbits as protein for the working dogs. My dogs have always done better on a raw diet.
@@cherylmosher6026 Rabbit meat is awful lean for a dogs diet. I guess if you had another source of fat to mix in it would be OK. Rabbit is wonderful meat but it is very lean.
Rabbits are quiet and fairly low odor if you keep them clean. They make a great starter animals in suburban areas.
Cheryl - we use ours for our working dogs
Could you just do the slatted wood for 2 or 3 rows? And straight grass on the middle ?
Why not just keep about four inches of wood or metal at the interior edges to prevent digging out, and open up the middle so they can eat better? And why not use the same corrugated plastic on your tall (forgot the European name) chicken tractors instead of tarps that wear out?
I was curious about just shielding the edges too and having the majority of the interior bottom open. Has anyone tried it? Do they still manage to dig out if only kept in place for a day or two before moving?
There is no meat product more tasty or cost effective than meat rabbits.
OH dear God, ain't happening no way. I have 3 as pets and they are litter trained and love to snuggle.
We have 2. They are really good pets!
The White the bunnies where pretty but the Dark bunnies was alright..... LOL
Started with 2, now we have 6
Lolol free coyote food
Rabbits are great, but they are very lean. The Inuit have an insult that translates literally to "rabbit eater", that means roughly "emotionally unstable idiot". Rabbits won't take over from chickens, as they don't produce a complete food.
Wrapped in duck fat it's great though. :-)
They may not like to eat the wire but they will eat the wooden slats.
I would like to build that step up, where could I go to find out the materials for it?
I’ll stick with my Easter bunnies, thank you very much; I still need eggs.
👍
What is the material you used for the covers on the enclosure?
For me personally, Rabbits are a no; unless they were caught on property doing something they shouldn't be. Then they go into the maggot bucket that feeds the chickens. Rabbits may be good for commercial steads and farms, but they are not sustainable in that they have no fat. If you only have rabbits you'd need to find a fat source in a hurry if buying/getting food off property became an issue (shtf). People start to starve if they don't get enough fat in their diet. Chickens, especially 16 weeks and older, build up a nice amount of fat.
We call them Wild Rabbits here in Australia .
Mate, we just call them rabbits and we have as many different breeds as anywhere else in the world. (Feral) rabbits are smaller than Rex rabbits, hares are quite a bit bigger. You're not a country boy are you, hey Jimmy?
And just for the record, mate We usually call them underground chicken.
@@Frombie_01 Actually i am a Farm boy , there were no rabbits here until they were imported back in the 1800s for sport Hunting .
Than we imported some Domestic Rabbits for table eating . Big Ones . we do have hares , also imported , they run wild But they aren't Rabbits .
❤️👍🙋♂️
What happens when the wind catches that thing and throws it across the field?
They are good cooked on a grill or cooked in a smoker. I like wild rabbit better but farm raised is good too.
So 2 things.
1. Has anyone tried to do a rabbit tractor with only wood board or metal sheets around the interior edges instead of slats? like 4-6" wide all around the inside of the interior walls and leaving the center part of the bottom entirely open for better grazing and natural behaviors? Or can they still dig out down and under the 6" inner floor and escape if they only stay in the same place a day or two? Genuinely curious, cause if it'd be a safe option that might work amazingly!
2. Can you build them a 3 sided mini shelter box to give them a place to hide if a predator starts harassing and circling the cages? That and it'd be a nice wind break and from rain in the wind. Like it could just block the shorter length edge and maybe a foot or two up the long sides, it'd be like 4'x2'x12" three sided wall?
How do the eggs taste compared to chickens?
What are the dimensions on those bottom slats? 2x2? 1x2?
Cavies next? Much easier to raise than chickens or rabbits and they process into single servings size.😉
Where'd yall get the inside cages?
😊😉🙂😍
How far apart are those bottom slats
2”
How long does the timber floor last ?
Could you do hardware cloth on the bottom?
Ok u just answered that question
TROUBLE IS THEY DONT LAY
❤🙏🏻🇺🇸
I have the Flemish Giants lot more meat but they cost more
Im new to the pasture farming, do yall move the animals back to coup/cage daily or leave them in the tractors? Thanks for the help