r/MeatRabbitry

I am Dutch, and here it is legally required to stun an animal using a captive bolt gun or electrical stunning, followed by cutting the throat; this seems a lot more difficult and messier to me than breaking the neck. Does anyone have experience with a captive bolt gun?

I live in the Dalles Oregon and am looking for a New Zealand or Tamuk doe to add to our rabbitry. Does anyone have any leads about an hour or so from the Dalles? I’ve tried arba and similar sites without much luck. Thanks

I've been wanting to get into meat rabbits. I'd like to hear y'all's favorite meat breeds and opinions on them

(This is a meat rabbitry sub for the discussion of meat rabbits, please no pet owners being hateful and judgy. Meat has to come from somewhere)

We recently got a breeding trio of tamuks and didn't think they were of breeding age yet (unfortunately never got a straight answer from the guy we got them from), but one of the does is starting to make a nest in a 5 gallon bucket we have about halfway in the ground. We are hoping that it will stay cool because it's in the ground, but should we move the nest/bucket or even take it out to replace with something better? It's hot here and will only get worse. We put ice in their water, have frozen bottles and a fan, but idk what we could do for kits inside the bucket. (Colony setup)

Another worry is the size as we built them based off of seeing other colony set ups using the buckets as nests, but it definitely seems small. First time mama and first litter for us if she is pregnant. We haven't seen any fur pulling, just straw in the nest.

I just want to know before I get any rabbits so that I can try to eliminate them from my yard before feeding them bits out of the yard and is it okay to feed them mowed grass?

I'm looking for any tips before I start getting a few breeders from someone

Another process day tomorrow. I also have to cull a few. That is the hardest part. You get to know these rabbits but there comes a time you have to cull bucks because they are not mounting efficiently or does that produce the way they once did. This is the part of breeding rabbits that breaks my heart. I have a great relationship with all my rabbits but cull day adds so much stress and heartache.

I wanna get into meat rabbitry, but I don't wanna get into it unless I know I like rabbit meat. Been looking on Craigslist and other places but they just sell the rabbit. We're located in North Florida

Should I just buy a rabbit and dispatch it at this point?

It feels so awful but meats gotta come from somewhere.

Might add onto this, I need to do things around the house. Super sorry if I dont reply to comments immediately

Lindos conejitos

Title pretty much explains it. I have been interested in meat rabbits for some time and while doing research I have found some people do colony style and let the bucks free range in with the does all the time versus keeping bucks and does separate in cages all the time and having to time everything right yourself. Just trying to understand why people do it differently. Thanks in advance

All my ladies (4) does share a 10 by 20 space . Wire is buried . They all get along . This is the first time any of them are kindling in the colony . Not sure what to expect. Will the other does kill the baby? The mom about to kindle is a seasoned mom but the other 3 does are all young (4 months and under) . Wasn’t sure what to expect .
We keep our bucks separate. We have 4 XL totes in different areas of the colony we converted to nesting boxes .

My kits all have crusty looking ears all of a sudden. Was researching online and the internet said it's ear mites and that the best thing to do was keep them out of their environment for 4-6 weeks as we treat them. Problem is, we can't do that - we built up a fenced in area and have them in there colony style. Any advice on treating while keeping them in their current enclosure? Is ivermectin the standard treatment? Babies are about 6-8 weeks from harvesting.

Second question. One of my does built a nest overnight and I checked for babies this morning. There weren't any babies but there was a long stringy foul smelling thing covered in mamas fur with a bunch of maggots. Ew. I'm assuming it's a miscarriage but would love to hear from someone more experienced.

We are in central texas and it just got HOT here after a very wet and cool spring. We picked breeds that are more tolerant of the heat (New Zealand and Californian) but I'm worried they are getting too hot. I'd love all your tips for keeping the rabbits cool in the summer! Thanks in advance for all your advice 😊

So I messed up (twofold) and as a beginner looking to help other beginners, I figured I’d make a post about it.

Last night, the door on my grow out cage failed. I didn’t know until I went out this morning. My grow outs are 8 weeks, and a few days prior I moved 4 to the new cage and left 2 with mom. This morning, only 1 was in the grow out cage.

By some miracle, the 3 escapees survived. After wrangling them, I had my helper put one of them in mom’s cage. DO NOT DO THIS. Even though babies had only been out for a couple of days, escapee smelled like outside. Mom went feral and attacked her and the 2 others in the cage that she had been just fine with. Escapee got the worst of it. She’s still alive but has some bad lacerations and I’m not sure if she’s going to make it. Luckily my helper was there and could keep momma still while I rescued the three kits with her.

I feel horrible, as that poor bun had what I’m sure was a terrifying night only to be hurt by her momma.

TL;DR: once kits have been moved, even for a few days, do not assume mom will be kind to having them back.

Hello, I'm new to meat rabbits and wanted to know how everyone makes summers easier. So far so we've been freezing giant bottles of water for their wire outdoor cages, in shade and it's been working great! But there's been a few times where we can't get any ice out to them during hot times because of work.

I've been debating getting a shed and running a window ac but that's a lot of money.

Does anyone have any advice to make summer more hands off when it comes to keeping rabbits cool?

I’m getting back in to meat rabbits!

The backstory is that I got divorced and had to give up my goats, chickens, rabbits, sheep and cows. this past winter, I helped my then boyfriend get going with meat rabbits. He acted like it was a shared project at first, and then got weird about it. He broke up with me shortly after breeding rabbits (thank you avoidant attachment).

One of the things that I took from this was not to wait to do the things that I want to do. one of the things I’m trying not to learn from this, is to be bitter and not collaborate with people 😂

Anyway, the stars aligned and an old friend reached out to me, offering me some rabbits that are direct descendants of my original meat rabbit herd!
I cried real happy tears and ordered cages and supplies immediately.

Cages come Tuesday, rabbits come Wednesday or Thursday!

If you made it this far, thanks for reading!