Old and new rabbits

Well I've had a lot on what with getting ready for Christmas and I've been ill, and looking after kids etc so excuse me for not updating!  Also the Alum I had ordered didn't come for over a week so I had to chuck the last 3 pelts from the older rabbits as I was giving them a wash, the hair was falling out and they smelled bad not surprisingly.   Such a waste.  But on to other news...

The first litter that was born to my rex's is coming up to their 8 week birthday,  they are also eatings LOADS!  Seriously I have 4 adults, 1 x 8 week litter of 10, and another 2 very small litters and I'm sure I went through 10Kg of pellets in one week.   Due to this and the fact that they are keeping me busy with the amount of associated cleaning out that has to be done everyday I have decided the end is nigh for them.

They are growing fast and I have possibly 2 reserved as pets by people so I'll keep them as long as I can but I'm thinking 1 or 2 or 3  or all 8 maybe will go within the next day.  If I can find the time.  I'll keep you updated

Merry Christmas!!

Pelts

At the moment I have 3 pelts soaking in salt water, I'm going to try a slightly different method to last time.  I've ordered some Alum as I may get better results.  I hope it comes soon as these pelt have been soaking for 3 days now and I should do something with them soon.

Some of the meat from the rabbits I've frozen for a later date, some the dogs have had and I've cooked 1 leg to give us a taster of what it was like.  I braised, and roasted it and it wasn't bad, a little tough though so maybe a casserole would be the thing to try next.

The first pelt I did is not looking too bad at all.  It is reasonably soft, the fur is lovely, just got to think what to use it for now :)

Three more rabbits

Ok so the first fur didn't work out too well, the hair is falling out a lot but the skin is fairy soft so I may still be able to use it.  I'm leaving that to one side for the moment and thinking about dinner...

I have baby rabbits who are almost 4 weeks old which is great, they are thriving with their mum but they will soon get to the stage where they should be weaning and sexed and sent to their own same sex cages.  Which is a bit of a problem as I've run out... of cages.  I also have 2 other pregnant does due in a couple of weeks.

This led to the decision more practise furs and dinner needs to be prepared.  I have 3 rabbits that are biding their time so today was their time.  I thought it best to do all 3 at once to get it over and done with and that way I might learn quicker rather than having a gap in between each one.

Having dislocated the neck using the broom method I hung them up.  Then went to have breakfast.  I think being hungry gave me that extra edge!  I didn't bother whacking them over the head as it didn't work very well last time and thought it would be quicker not doing so.  When I got back to them perhaps 45 minutes later they has cooled down and stiffened a little. I probably left them a little too long.  Anyway time to get started.

I was a little more careful this time skinning the first rabbit as I didn't want fat left on it only to have to get it off later.  It took quite a while for me to skin it this time because of this and it was freezing in the shed!  I left the head on until the last minute this time but I think I got a little blood on the fur... I bagged it up with a little fly spray just in case and put to one side.

After skinning of course I was left with the carcass, actually quite a bit of fat on this one! Saying that, the fat is generally all just under the skin and is very easy to separate from the meat which is very lean  This one is for human consumption so I portioned it up into back, flank and back legs, keeping the liver and kidneys.

 I gave everything else to the dogs which was basically the front half of the rabbit inc. spine, front legs, excess fat, guts feet and head and any other bits! They ate everything straight away apart from the head, saving that for later....

The skin is now soaking in salt water to clean it and to loosen any fat that needs to come off.

This seemed very labour intensive to me but I'm sure I'll get quicker at it the more I do.

I think this rabbit will make up portions for 4-6 people and of course the 2 dogs :)

Now all I have to do is the same to the other two rabbits and to find some recipes!

Fur falling out.

Oh dear, my bathroom is covered in fur.  I've been stretching and stretching but fur is flying out all over the place.  I read somewhere that if the fur gets rewetted that it will loosen the fur so I'm guessing that is what happened.  It's all a learning process, and I will try again using a slightly different method. I'm wondering whether to try Alum as I've heard it is better than the borax method but still doesn't make it waterproof.

What I'm trying to do is find a way to do it in an enviromentally friendly way.  I think Alum and the professional chemicals you can use can contaminate water sources and can be difficult to dispose of safely, that's why I chose the borax.  Maybe next time I'll wash the pelt first, then use a paste to tan it, much as in the method described in the link at the bottom of the page for 'tanning with Alum' but with Borax.  I'll keep you posted :)

and stretch!

After washing it yesterday it had absorbed water again so was soft and supple again.  So I stretched it in all directions and I must say it was a lot easier when wet.  I imagine if I keep doing that then the finished product will be more soft and supple.

The down side being that in the process of stretching I managed to tear a few clumps of the fur out.  A lot of the fur is falling out now so I'm feeling a bit disheartened.  It may be me being too rough with it or some other reason I don't know.  I'll have to look into why that might be happening.

Meanwhile there are some baby standard rex rabbits growing up in the spare room.  They are 3 weeks old now and absolutely adorable.  There are 10 of them of various colours and I'm trying to not forget they will end up a blanket!  That is, if I can get the tanning process sorted out.  They are hopping about all over the place and running rings around the mother who is still looking good.  At the moment they are in a 47" dog cage with the door open so they can run around the room.  However they don't need the door open because they can very easily squeeze through the bars.   I shall have to refine the cage for future litters or the babies might get mixed up if I have more than one litter at a time.  Some mesh, cable tied around the bottom of the cage would perhaps do the job.

Photos coming soon.

Please do comment!

Quick update : Smelly

Well I had a look at the fur again hung in the bathroom last night and it was smelly, Now the skin was dry, the fur was dry and it struck me I hadn't washed it other than in salt yet.  So I shampooed it.  The skin was also smelly so I rubbed some body wash into it.  It smells nice now :)
I'll put up pics later...

The fur

Last night I had a go at the rabbit fur.  It was 1 am and I was supposed to be going to bed, I'd already spent half an hour in the rabbit room feeding, watering and cuddling the babies.   The skin of the pelt had dried out quite quickly so I started manipulating it , stretching gently and rubbing it together like you would washing. The rubbing didn't do much good so I used a rounded bit of wood I had handy and rubbed it back and forth on that, working my way around the pelt.  After working a part of it I could see the difference in the skin.  It went from a creamy brown colour to white.  I had to be really careful stretching it as the skin is quite thin. I did break it at one point.  I'm not too bothered by this though as I see this one as a practice piece.  I've never done this before so this a learning process

I worked it all over for a while.  Bear in mind this is 1.15 am and I'm quite tired.  I do have a problem going to bed too late!  It was softening up nicely I thought, I was working the edges the most as they were quite stiff. Each stretch or rub would make it a bit more white.  Quite satisfying work.

This morning I have a look at it and it still quite stiff, perhaps I should wet it a bit more and do some more work on it.

Any comments are welcome :)

Processing rabbit

Well I did do it!

It was really hard for me to actually kill the rabbit.  I've always considered myself an animal lover and I have taken pride in the fact that I do my best to never hurt another living creature.  However I have justified it to myself by the fact that it is a natural thing to do.  Why pay for someone else to do it if you haven't got the guts to do it yourself?  Isn't that just a little bit hypocritical?  If you eat meat, wear leather or use any other animal product then you are responsible for at least a few animals deaths.  This is just a more direct way of taking responsibility for you sustaining yourself and your family. Please don't read on if you are likely to get offended by killing, skinning and eating of a rabbit

Anyway this is what I did:

This was the rabbit, not wanted by previous owner, given to me for free, I considered breeding from her but she wasn't as good as my other rabbits.  

I stunned the rabbit but giving it a whack between the eyes and then putting a broom handle over its neck and holding the handle down with my feet I stretching the back legs up and back to dislocate the neck.  I was shaking badly at this point and my heart was beating so fast I had to take a minute to calm down but it was a quick death for the rabbit, I hope it gets easier.

It was plainly dead at this point so I hang it up by putting a hook through one of the hocks on a back leg. I then cut the head off and let it drain for a few minutes.  Immediately threw the head to my gsd. Yum she says!
I then skinned as best as I could  and took out the guts.  At this point I could see what I'd been doing it for.  The small rabbit had a surprising amount of meat on her. The butchering was just a way to get at this lovely low fat, high protein meat.  It seemed worth it then.
I fed the rest of the bunny to the dog.  This was an older bunny so might be a bit tough for the family to eat as a first rabbit, the dog doesn't mind!  Raw meat is great for dogs and I want the best for my dogs but I'm sure that is another blog.

Echo, 8 month old really enjoyed her raw meat dinner.  She ate half and my other dog ate the other half.

I  stripped off as well as I could fatty tissue and other bits from he skin then coated it in salt. Fur side down and left it for about 48 hours.

I brushed off salt and rinsed it, then put it in a pickling solution of water, borax, citric acid and salt. Left for about 48 hours

I then squeezed it out and put in a neutralizing solution of sodium bicarbonate and water. Left for about 15 minutes.

Squeezed out again and hung up to dry a bit fur side up.

Combed out the fur and spread aqueous cream on to the skin side and hung up again, skin side up.
That's where I'm up to.

I'm hoping it will end up being a lovely soft pelt that I can make into something practical.  Perhaps a blanket when I add some more pelts to it!
Next time I'll tell you what happened next.

Starting out

The truth is that rabbit are an environmentally friendly and sustainable source of meat and fur.  Some people don't like the idea because they are cute and fluffy and they are, they so are.  It doesn't get away from the fact though that pound for pound they convert food into meat better and faster than cows or any other conventional meat producing animal.  Their manure is also good for the garden raw.  By raw I mean it doesn't need to be composted first. Compared to a cow they require less space and they produce more.  There you have it

I used to be of the view point that fur was BAD. However I have started breeding rabbits as a cheap source of meat. I'm not sure at the moment how cheap it is as I've spent quite a bit so far but hopefully they are set up expenses and not ongoing!  I know where my rabbits come from, I know they are not battery farmed, I know they are looked after properly.  I can also enjoy their cuteness up until their time.  It would obviously be a waste to throw away all that lovely fur...