I did it people! I butchered my own rabbits after debating it for years! I've wanted to try it out on my own for years but was never brave enough. I've always felt a bit squeamish about killing something but have never had issues dissecting or doing autopsies on rabbits that were already dead. After encouragement, I decided to finally give it a go and I have to say, over all it was a positive experience and will do it again. I did lots of research on the internet on how to butcher rabbits, watched videos (very good way to learn if you don't have somebody that can show you) and presto! Ok, so it wasn't that easy. I had to get over my fear (I guess you could call it) of killing the rabbits. I guess I was afraid of how gory and violent it would be. I discovered that it is quick, easy, humane and painless. However, I did encounter some issues. No, not with processing the animals but with other certain close people who were offended that I would butcher and eat my rabbits. We all have our own opinions on eating animals but let me tell you all something about mine. I would much rather eat one of my own homegrown rabbits than any mass farm raised chicken or beef. Why you ask? Because I know what goes into my rabbits and I know how they are cared for. I know that my rabbits are clean, healthy, happy, and hormone free when I eat them. And, yet, people think it's cruel to kill a cute bunny. The fact of the matter is, my meat rabbits are not pets. They are livestock and are raised accordingly. I don't bond with them even if they're cute and they are never sold as pets. The fact is that rabbits were originally developed to be eaten, for pelts, and wool. Only recently have rabbits been considered as pets to some. There are some rabbits that are bred for good temperaments or have no other purpose than to just be cute (Netherland Dwarfs are a good example) but there are many breeds out there that are only raised, and were originally developed for meat production. Here are few things I've learned since trying this out that other beginners should probably know.
1. If you are going to do a meat project and hope to get the most meat possible out of a single rabbit, don't breed 2 smaller animals. Yup. That's what I did. At the time, all I had was a smaller buck and a smaller doe. Both were nice quality animals but on the small side. The mom had a nice big litter of 9 kits and raised them all but consequently, they all stayed on the small side except one. Even with free feeding, they did not grow as fast as they should have for meat animals. This meant that in order to get them to butchering weight (around 5 Lbs), I had to feed them and let them grow out much longer than I wanted and yes, Satins can EAT! These stinkers burned through my feed like I had never seen and yet still did not grow out fast enough. Make sure at least one of the parents (preferably the doe) is big! If you breed 2 petite rabbits, the babies will not grow to your butchering weight as fast meaning that you will be feeding longer and spending more money on their feed. If you choose not to wait, then you end up with a smaller amount of meat. You may ask, well, why not wait till they are bigger and get even more meat? As rabbits mature, their meat becomes less ideal in quality. With what I've been told, the meat becomes tougher, flavor is not as nice, and you get more fat but less meat. Fat can be yummy but not a lot of fat. You want the rabbit to have lots of muscle (this is your meat) and a little bit of fat is fine. Younger rabbits at around 5 Lbs are in their meat quality prime. Don't get me wrong, you can eat rabbits at any age you want but there are ages when meat quality is better than others. However, remember, not too young either. You won't get much meat. For one, they are small so the amount of meat you get won't be good and for another, young juniors often have not built up muscle tone. A lot of juniors go through what breeders like to call the uglies. They get gangly, thin, and don't have good flesh condition. You really don't want to butcher at this point. They need to hit a point when they have built up muscle tone and feel firm.
2. Don't bond with your meat rabbits even if they are friendly. Now, most meat rabbits haven't been bred for the greatest temperaments. If they have good temperaments, great but most meat rabbits I've raised have never been overly friendly or calm. In fact, some are down right nuts so it's impossible to bond with them and hard to put up with long enough for them to reach butcher weight. In fact, out of all the breeds I've raised, my meat rabbits are the ones I've had most bites from and I haven't had them for very long. In fact, I just recently had a hungry POed brood doe chomp on my hand when I reached into her cage. If your meat rabbits are anything like this or just plain skittish, it shouldn't be hard not to bond with them. They kind of sabotage that themselves. However, sometimes you can have sweet easy going meat rabbits which makes butcher really hard when that time comes. Of course, my first litter had to be super easy going and friendly. Of course, I didn't help myself by handling them a lot since it was my first litter of Satins and I was excited. I liked to visit with them and feed them treats which I should have never done. When butchering time came around, I found myself not wanting to hurt them and since I'd never butchered, I was scared of hurting them in the process.
3. Just do it. If you have picked the way you want to get the dirty job done, don't be afraid to just go out there and try it. The worst that can happen is that it doesn't kill them. Killing something is never pretty and hard to do for the first time but if you're going to kill it do it quickly and make sure it gets done the first time. Don't kill them half way and then get scared and chicken out. You are doing less damage by doing the job completely. Most suggested methods are well proven, clean, fast, and nearly fool proof. Most of them are pretty humane and kill the animal instantly unless you do something completely wrong. I chose to use the rebarr method which is actually very easy for anybody and almost completely mistake proof. All it takes is a little coordination and minimal muscle on your part. I was very hesitant to use this method afraid I would do something wrong and cause them pain and suffering in the process but I soon found out that that's not the case. I won't go into graphic details so if anybody wants to know how this method works, I'd be happy to explain it to you by email. Don't freak out if you see the rabbit kicking and twitching for a few minutes after you do the job. This is only reflexes. As long as you make the kill appropriately, they die instantly. All that is left are unconscious reflexs.
4. Make sure you are educated on how to properly dispatch (kill), gut, and clean a rabbit before you just head out there and do it. In other words, just because you may have butchered an animal before, don't bet that every animal is the same way. Yah, they all have pelts, they all need to be gutted, but there might be a difference in the method depending on the animal. There are a lot of tips, tricks, and methods out there that you can learn by just surfing the net. I would hate to throw my effort, time, and money down the drain by ruining the job and having to toss the meat.
5. "Butchering is far too bloody for me. I can't stomach it." This is something I hear time and time again. In actuality, the whole cleaning and gutting process is surprisingly not usually very bloody unless you don't do it correctly. It's actually a lot cleaner than I had originally thought years ago. However, I did have some issues when it came to removing the head. I found that a lot of blood pools around the neck because of the method I used to dispatched the rabbit. Other methods such as shooting or clubbing are said to be cleaner. I would like to try a cleaner method next time.
6. Butchering might go a little slowly at first but after a whole litter, you'll have it down and you'll find it takes you half the time to gut and clean.
7. You may be able to get away with putting the carcase strait into the freezer but I don't take chances. With larger animals, the meat must have a chance to cool down evenly. The inner meat will take longer to cool down. If you try to freeze something that is warm in the middle, the outside will freeze leaving the inside thawed. This causes the inside to rot and your meat is useless. I like to soak mine in ice. Since I don't want flies crawling all over my meat, this method works great. I just take a plastic storage bin and a lid, disinfect it, add ice, and put the carcases into it while I butcher another rabbit. The carcases should be plenty cool through and through after about 10 or 15 minutes. A lot of times, once i'm done gutting and cleaning, it's already cool but it never hurts to be careful. I feel more confident when I put the rabbits in the freezer and they're already nice and cold.
8. How do you package your meat? Well, that's still a bit of a quandary for me. There are different ways to do it but unfortunately, I was out of freezer bags so I had to make due with what I could find. As long as you have something sanitary and you seal it well, a lot of different things can work. I like using plastic freezer bags or whatever else I can find and I double wrap each rabbit to help prevent freezer burn. I like to make sure they are as dry as possible before they go into the freezer so they don't stick to the packaging. I wouldn't suggest using anything like paper sacks or newspaper because I would think these will not resist freezer damage and may stick to the meat. However, some people may say otherwise. If you can find special meat freezer bags, go for it.
That's about all the tips I have for now. Hope that helps! Now, go out and enjoy some rabbit!
1. If you are going to do a meat project and hope to get the most meat possible out of a single rabbit, don't breed 2 smaller animals. Yup. That's what I did. At the time, all I had was a smaller buck and a smaller doe. Both were nice quality animals but on the small side. The mom had a nice big litter of 9 kits and raised them all but consequently, they all stayed on the small side except one. Even with free feeding, they did not grow as fast as they should have for meat animals. This meant that in order to get them to butchering weight (around 5 Lbs), I had to feed them and let them grow out much longer than I wanted and yes, Satins can EAT! These stinkers burned through my feed like I had never seen and yet still did not grow out fast enough. Make sure at least one of the parents (preferably the doe) is big! If you breed 2 petite rabbits, the babies will not grow to your butchering weight as fast meaning that you will be feeding longer and spending more money on their feed. If you choose not to wait, then you end up with a smaller amount of meat. You may ask, well, why not wait till they are bigger and get even more meat? As rabbits mature, their meat becomes less ideal in quality. With what I've been told, the meat becomes tougher, flavor is not as nice, and you get more fat but less meat. Fat can be yummy but not a lot of fat. You want the rabbit to have lots of muscle (this is your meat) and a little bit of fat is fine. Younger rabbits at around 5 Lbs are in their meat quality prime. Don't get me wrong, you can eat rabbits at any age you want but there are ages when meat quality is better than others. However, remember, not too young either. You won't get much meat. For one, they are small so the amount of meat you get won't be good and for another, young juniors often have not built up muscle tone. A lot of juniors go through what breeders like to call the uglies. They get gangly, thin, and don't have good flesh condition. You really don't want to butcher at this point. They need to hit a point when they have built up muscle tone and feel firm.
2. Don't bond with your meat rabbits even if they are friendly. Now, most meat rabbits haven't been bred for the greatest temperaments. If they have good temperaments, great but most meat rabbits I've raised have never been overly friendly or calm. In fact, some are down right nuts so it's impossible to bond with them and hard to put up with long enough for them to reach butcher weight. In fact, out of all the breeds I've raised, my meat rabbits are the ones I've had most bites from and I haven't had them for very long. In fact, I just recently had a hungry POed brood doe chomp on my hand when I reached into her cage. If your meat rabbits are anything like this or just plain skittish, it shouldn't be hard not to bond with them. They kind of sabotage that themselves. However, sometimes you can have sweet easy going meat rabbits which makes butcher really hard when that time comes. Of course, my first litter had to be super easy going and friendly. Of course, I didn't help myself by handling them a lot since it was my first litter of Satins and I was excited. I liked to visit with them and feed them treats which I should have never done. When butchering time came around, I found myself not wanting to hurt them and since I'd never butchered, I was scared of hurting them in the process.
3. Just do it. If you have picked the way you want to get the dirty job done, don't be afraid to just go out there and try it. The worst that can happen is that it doesn't kill them. Killing something is never pretty and hard to do for the first time but if you're going to kill it do it quickly and make sure it gets done the first time. Don't kill them half way and then get scared and chicken out. You are doing less damage by doing the job completely. Most suggested methods are well proven, clean, fast, and nearly fool proof. Most of them are pretty humane and kill the animal instantly unless you do something completely wrong. I chose to use the rebarr method which is actually very easy for anybody and almost completely mistake proof. All it takes is a little coordination and minimal muscle on your part. I was very hesitant to use this method afraid I would do something wrong and cause them pain and suffering in the process but I soon found out that that's not the case. I won't go into graphic details so if anybody wants to know how this method works, I'd be happy to explain it to you by email. Don't freak out if you see the rabbit kicking and twitching for a few minutes after you do the job. This is only reflexes. As long as you make the kill appropriately, they die instantly. All that is left are unconscious reflexs.
4. Make sure you are educated on how to properly dispatch (kill), gut, and clean a rabbit before you just head out there and do it. In other words, just because you may have butchered an animal before, don't bet that every animal is the same way. Yah, they all have pelts, they all need to be gutted, but there might be a difference in the method depending on the animal. There are a lot of tips, tricks, and methods out there that you can learn by just surfing the net. I would hate to throw my effort, time, and money down the drain by ruining the job and having to toss the meat.
5. "Butchering is far too bloody for me. I can't stomach it." This is something I hear time and time again. In actuality, the whole cleaning and gutting process is surprisingly not usually very bloody unless you don't do it correctly. It's actually a lot cleaner than I had originally thought years ago. However, I did have some issues when it came to removing the head. I found that a lot of blood pools around the neck because of the method I used to dispatched the rabbit. Other methods such as shooting or clubbing are said to be cleaner. I would like to try a cleaner method next time.
6. Butchering might go a little slowly at first but after a whole litter, you'll have it down and you'll find it takes you half the time to gut and clean.
7. You may be able to get away with putting the carcase strait into the freezer but I don't take chances. With larger animals, the meat must have a chance to cool down evenly. The inner meat will take longer to cool down. If you try to freeze something that is warm in the middle, the outside will freeze leaving the inside thawed. This causes the inside to rot and your meat is useless. I like to soak mine in ice. Since I don't want flies crawling all over my meat, this method works great. I just take a plastic storage bin and a lid, disinfect it, add ice, and put the carcases into it while I butcher another rabbit. The carcases should be plenty cool through and through after about 10 or 15 minutes. A lot of times, once i'm done gutting and cleaning, it's already cool but it never hurts to be careful. I feel more confident when I put the rabbits in the freezer and they're already nice and cold.
8. How do you package your meat? Well, that's still a bit of a quandary for me. There are different ways to do it but unfortunately, I was out of freezer bags so I had to make due with what I could find. As long as you have something sanitary and you seal it well, a lot of different things can work. I like using plastic freezer bags or whatever else I can find and I double wrap each rabbit to help prevent freezer burn. I like to make sure they are as dry as possible before they go into the freezer so they don't stick to the packaging. I wouldn't suggest using anything like paper sacks or newspaper because I would think these will not resist freezer damage and may stick to the meat. However, some people may say otherwise. If you can find special meat freezer bags, go for it.
That's about all the tips I have for now. Hope that helps! Now, go out and enjoy some rabbit!