Our first attempt at breeding Sweetie, our well-mannered, dainty queen of the rabbitry did not go well, and she gave birth on the cage floor. We eventually lost all of them after trying to revive the surviving kits under a heat lamp....
The bunnies didn't make it
September 12, 2011, 14:04
We left the nesting box with mom for two days - all readings suggested interfering as little as possible (especially since we'd already had to handle them). Taking everyone outside into the shade of the apple tree, we found the babies had all died in their nesting box. I'm not sure if it was simply too confusing for Sweetie, or if she rejected them because we'd handled them and brought them back to her. I don't think that she knew what to do - though she was lactating the morning after giving birth. I buried the little bodies in the comfrey patch, sad that their lives had been so cruel. It's a bit of an odd feeling, since we were growing them for food, after all - but I had expected to provide them with sunshine and fresh greens and an outside run before ending their short lives as quickly as possible. There seemed to be a bit more balance to the process with that scenario in mind. I will try breeding the two girls at the same time next week, so that Darla can be used as a foster mother if she seems to be more capable. I knew this venture wasn't going to be simple or easy, and I have never taken lightly the fact that I am responsible for the lives of my animals. I'm also very glad that I'm not urgently needing to be sustaining myself from my own labour. This loss makes me even more aware of how fragile the food chain really is, and how much we take for granted the easy availability of food in our commercial 24/7 society. If only we knew then that Darla would be an unfit mother herself, and wound up killing all but one of her third and last litter before we culled her. We bred them both soon after...
Livestock update and feed costing
September 28, 2011, 17:06
The girls are both halfway through their (assumed) pregnancies, and aside from being occasionally skittish or growly, are happily eating their greens and snatching their apple slices, both seemingly content with the world. Sweetie is notably less aggressive than during her last pregnancy. Everyone is getting outside time on the weekends at least - as now it is almost too dark by the time we arrive home from work for me to rush and collect greens for their evening enjoyment. For now - until the frost hits - the rabbits have a selection of roughly five or six types of greens a day (dandelion, comfrey, mint, lemon or lime balm, strawberry leaves, plantain, kale, celery leaf and sorrel...), but the selection is dwindling with the waning daylight and colder temperatures. There will be more reliance on apples, pears, carrots, (the dehydrator is running most days with local fruit), whole-grain bread (they *love* oats), apple tree twigs and hay in the colder months, and hardier greens. Having just purchased a new fancy dehydrator (3-7 days shipping), I will try to dehydrate some of the greens we're currently feeding to store for occasional winter food interest. I like to think this gives them a nice change-up in their day, something entertaining to do with their time, and is helping cut down on the amount of pellets they're eating as well. We aren't sure if they're using the mineral licks, or if the humidity is affecting them, since several have broken apart and most of them seem 'wet.' The rabbits are never near them in my line-of-sight. This weekend we drove out to the Feed store in Abbotsford, and dropped two hundred dollars on animal feed. We grabbed two bales of Timothy hay ($26.00), now hanging from the ceiling in the carport (sorry rodents!), as well as:
- 3 20kg bags of "16% Rabbit Pellets" ($13.99 each)
- 1 bag of "25% Horse Creep Feed" ($18.99) to help with rabbit pregnancy and lactation, and as a fattening boost for kits once they're eating solid food. Currently introducing a small handfull daily to the girls' diet in preparation for their kindling.
- 1 40lb bag of "Step 2 Sweet Feed" ($15.49) for both rabbits and chickens - grains and molasses mix to help the animals generate internal heat in the colder weather
- 1 20kg "18% Free Range Crumble" ($11.99) to be mixed with
- 1 20kg "16% Organic Layer Mash" ($18.99) for the chickens, along with
- 1 20kg "Hen Scratch" ($11.79) to occupy the birds once we have them confined for the day in the hoophouse on a deep straw litter.
- finally, 1 40lb sack of Black Oil Sunflower Seeds ($24.97) as a treat for everyone
That was the litter where Darla gave birth to Spot, our sweet-tempered scratch-loving little buddy who is having some ear mite problems right now. He was the pick of the litters when we had our important first cull and became 'fully' experienced meat-rabbit raisers
The deed is done
January 11, 2012, 12:48
Eleven bunnies went to freezer camp this past weekend. We decided to keep back one friendly boy, now named 'Spot' by Adrian, who thinks it's an ironic moniker for an albino.... All went relatively well, and each bunny was dispatched as quickly as possible out of sight, smell and earshot of everyone else. Processing was repetitive and caused muscle issues, but the whole experience was rather affirming and fascinating. We are lucky people and are looking forward to new births this weekend with freshly scrubbed cages and fidgety mothers (Sweetie seems to have forgotten what the nesting box is about, and has eaten or trampled multiple loads of straw through the cage bottom). It's difficult to put a price on the 'lappin' we've produced. The final tally of our eleven culled rabbits was: 37 pounds live weight, 21 pounds of carcass weight. We saved livers, and decided we weren't really thrilled with the taste, never having been fond of liver in the first place - but the livers, hearts and kidneys should be saved and fed to the chickens as a very good 'free' source of healthy protein. Those and other 'parts' could be saved for dog treats and food. Extra rabbit manure could be bagged and sold, worms could be raised in beds beneath rabbit cages for fishing, chicken feed, or for vermicomposting, or chickens can forage underneath the cages to clean up spilled food and aerate manure and bedding for garden mulch use and add a secondary use for space allocated to rabbit raising.
Keeping in mind that we were feeding 3 breeding adults from date-of-purchase and raising a secondary breeding male, 15 rabbits -to date- have eaten (roughly) $95.00 - worth of pellets, (bad stop-gap purchase of a small $25 bulk bag at a pet store took that over the top)
$10 sweet feed, oats and manna, (partial bags shared with the chickens)
$50 worth of alfalfa hay
$10 of carrot 'seconds'
$10 of local apples (dehydrated for rabbit treats)
Greens, herbs and branches from the garden and kitchen scraps
My head is spinning a bit here.....That's roughly $22 a month since this venture started in May; three months from birth to butcher for the two litters means all 15 rabbits ate $66.00 in those three growing months, at $4.40 averaged feed cost per rabbit. Our meat cost does not include the initial set-up and supplies ($1080.00 for breeding stock, cages and supplies that should last for ten years or more) or our labour, though much of it was enjoyable time petting and watching bunnies, and the dirty parts at least were exercise out in the sunshine, benefitting the garden (no need to buy manure this Spring at $50.00 on average application and from questionable sources). So, 21 pounds of rabbit meat averaged $2.30 a pound. Local grocery stores have Extra Lean 'Canadian' ground beef ("fluff style"?!? - granted, no bones) advertised on special for $3.49/lb, and chicken breast at $4.99/lb this week comparatively (again no bones). Whole Rabbit at local grocery stores runs $7.00/lb - but at that cost, we would never have consumed it on a regular basis.
If we're eating our own meat for $2.30 a pound, and locally available, comparable meat averages $4.25 a pound - *on sale - currently* we save $1.95 per pound on our grocery bill when we choose to eat meat.
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