I am so proud of myself this week. There was a time, not so long ago, when I never imagined I could raise and harvest my own meat – even though factory-farmed meat sickens me, and I desperately wanted a way of assuring my meat was humanely and happily raised, as well as humanely killed. I also liked the idea of knowing exactly what my future meat was eating!
I started out by designing and building – entirely by myself (other than some help lifting the walls and roof into place) a colony bunny barn. You can read about that, here.
From my first breeding, I got six kits, and boy howdy, were they cute!
Twelve weeks later, they weren’t quite so adorable, and it was time.
I used my ballista, a captive bolt gun, which made the death entirely instantaneous and humane. The part that was hardest on the rabbits was the weighing before hand – for some reason, they hate going into the basket scale. The rest of the process was MUCH faster and simpler than chickens. I let the meat rest in the fridge for 24 hours, and then cut it up into servings and froze them. Again, much easier than chickens!
From six rabbits, I have enough meat for fourteen meals, PLUS a huge pot of extra bits to turn into broth. Several more meals, right there!
We ate the livers fried – rabbit livers are even more mellow flavored than chicken livers – and yesterday, had our first official rabbit meal. I used two of the thighs, in an Asian sauce over rice.
Turned out perfectly! I’m sold. These rabbits are going to work out really well on our farm.
Out of Eden 
Not many people raise them anymore. One of my colleagues raised them back in the 1980s, and maybe into the 1990s, but I do not know of anyone here who does it. Some people raise llamas because they are still a fad. They brag about how people in the Andes use them for wool, but no one really uses the wool here. It is just a fad to brag about. The llamas do not seem very happy to be landscape accessories.
Do llamas ever seem happy about anything? 🙂
hmmmm, that is a good point.