RAISING RABBITS TO PLAN FOR A SHTF SCENARIO
Back in the 1930s during the middle of the Great Depression. Families raised rabbits in hutches and pens in their backyards to provide a healthy protein source to supplement the victory gardens and help with the grocery budget. They would gather grass, weeds, and vegetable waste to feed their rabbits.
So I feel we should learn from what our parents, grandparents, and great-grandparents did a few generations ago. Rabbits can be a good source of protein for your family during tough times. They multiply quickly, don’t need much space, don’t eat much food, produce excellent manure, and are easy to handle and butcher.
Join The Rabbit Revolution! Raise Rabbits Today! Start your own self sufficient family meat supply to feed your family, gardens and compost piles today! Enjoy it today so you can learn everything now so that you will know more tomorrow. Think of it as money in the bank (or is that a bad saying, rabbits maybe worth more than money some day!)
When feeding your rabbits to help sustain you and your family in a SHTF situation you would want to feed them as cheap and as easily as possible. I have chosen to go as natural as possible. It will be a lot more work. I feed a lot of grass, weeds, garden scraps and produce, in season. There are lots of other food sources available brambles, herbs, tree twigs and sometimes a little fruit or dried bread. We still feed some pellets regularly but much lower amounts. This can be beneficial than just feeding one food source as it is easier to change their diet if one or the other food source is not available. If I did just feed my rabbits pellets and not feeding any natural foodstuff and one day I could not get pellets? It would take longer for their gut to get used to this new food source, changes in a rabbits diet should always be changed slowly. So if the rabbits have a varied diet, their food source can be changed sooner and healthier than a rabbit just fed pellets.
When starting to use a new food source and green foods you should introduce it slowly over a two-week trial. You need to give their gut time to develop the correct bacteria for digesting new foods. By doing this I have never had any trouble with diarrhea in my rabbitry. If you do then back off the forage for a day and give a straw, dried grass hay, or a small piece of dry bread. Some breeders feed rolled oats for this. By keeping your rabbits on both pelleted food and green food this can help out in case one or the other food source gives out. You need to make sure you feed both types at least every other day to keep their guts used to both.
SOME GOOD SHTF RABBIT FACTS-
Rabbits are quiet, No one will know you have a hidden meat supply.
Rabbits take up very little space, Easily hidden in a outbuilding or behind a fence.
Rabbits reproduce quickly, Fast sustaining meat supply.
Rabbits can be butcher as needed so no need for refrigeration. Store your meat on the hoof.
You only need one buck for every 10 does, Less mouths to feed. Always keep a spare buck as insurance!
Each doe will have on average have 45 to 50 kits per year each doe producing 150+ pounds of butchered meat.
Rabbits have a very short gestation period of 31 days and can be re bred 2 weeks after giving birth.
Rabbits sexually mature at about 5 to 6 months, Quick to add new breeding stock to up meat production.
Rabbit manure is the best fertilizer. Needed for your high production survival gardens.
Rabbits are herbivores but can ingest the cellulose material that a humans body will not so they do not compete with humans for a food source.
Rabbits can handle many different climates, Can be raised in a multitude of environments.
Rabbits also will produce some beautiful pelts that can be used for homestead projects or trade. Rabbit fur is great for keeping warm by making hats, mittens, blankets, coats etc!
Rabbit meat, pelts, manure, and breeding stock can be used for good bartering items.
Rabbits are inexpensive A 50lb bag of food is about $13+, as of the date of this post, It will rise! A adult rabbit should be fed a cup a day.
Did I mention how tasty rabbit meat is! You can cook it many ways bake it, fry it, roast it, smoke it, make jerky, can it, and more!
Caging can be made with locally scavenged materials. such as pallets and native trees or construction debris.
So get some rabbits and raise some good healthy meat you owe it to your family so in tough times you will have some meat on the table and in good times you will have a chance to see how to raise, feed, and care for rabbits! Join The Rabbit Revolution! Check out the these posts for more good information on the subject.
https://riseandshinerabbitry.com/2012/09/09/naturally-feeding-rabbits/
https://riseandshinerabbitry.com/2012/02/26/safe-food-list-for-rabbits/
https://riseandshinerabbitry.com/2012/03/31/the-benefits-and-uses-of-rabbit-manure/
https://riseandshinerabbitry.com/2012/01/19/basics-of-raising-meat-rabbits-on-the-homestead-part-1/
https://riseandshinerabbitry.com/2011/07/16/hello-world/
https://riseandshinerabbitry.com/2012/06/09/medicinal-herbs-for-rabbits/
https://riseandshinerabbitry.com/2013/10/23/beyond-the-pellet-feeding-rabbits-naturally/
https://riseandshinerabbitry.com/2012/01/22/tanning-rabbit-pelts/
Posted on May 13, 2012, in Uncategorized and tagged animals, grass weeds, grocery budget, nature, parents and grandparents, rabbit facts. Bookmark the permalink. 12 Comments.
Rise and Shine Rabbitry 
Good article. . one question. We have TONS of wild carrots growing around our property. We tried feeding this to the rabbits, but they’re not really intersted. . is it just cause it’s a new food, or is that not something you should feed to them? Thanks.
By wild carrots do you think they are Queens Ann Lace? The greens are OK but the flowers and seeds are not good for rabbits. All rabbits have different tastes try something else.
Great article as are they all. Really enjoy these. It’s nice to hear someone besides me who thinks it’s normal for rabbits to eat stuff like grass, greens, herbs and what ever else they would normally snitch from your garden if they were wild. When I got mine pairs the breeder said they could not eat that stuff and had to be fed pellets.
I switched them over slowly and now they eat the pellets only second to any crab grass, lambs quarter, mint or other garden stuff I throw in there. On days when I’m too busy to give them weeds, I’m given dirty looks, if such a thing is possible.
Rabbits love dandelions and it is a very nutritious feed. Best of all they grow all over the place. I eat them also. Good stuff!
Oh wow!! I stumbled apon your blog and it’s just what I’m looking for!! We live in Vancouver Canada and have just started raising our own meat rabbits. We have 4 small children and have gotten tired of this day and age where we are EXTREMELY removed from our food sources. All of our children know and understand why we are raising rabbits. Every post of yours I read I get super excited!! I’m hungry for even more insight and information! 🙂 so far we have 4 does and 1 male. They are all around 5 months old and we are excited to be moving into the breeding aspect of it! We have housed them in an old kennel on our 2 acres, that has 1/2 covered 1/2 grass. It’s perfect! My husband built little hatches above ground (with lots of room to grow!) and every day we let them out to run free in the grass section! We feed them kitchen scraps (they live apples!) and a bit of pellets. I do have a question though, when they have a litter, we were going to leave then together for 3 months? Then breed the mothers again? Or when should we move them into a bigger cage to cull them? 11 weeks they are still quite small… Also when will they start to mate? Will we just know? Will all the does start at the same time?
Your setup sounds awsome! Post a pic on my face-book wall! I do this because of people like you, I think everyone should be growing their own food, and protein is a very important part! What better protein than rabbits! At 5 months of age I breed my does, at 6 months I use the bucks for breeding, at 3 months I separate any kits by sex, the ones that are left that I have not harvested they are the best of the litter and these I save for breeding stock. I start to harvest the fryers at 8 weeks on, I re breed most of my does 2 weeks after they give birth and wean the kits at 4 weeks, and she is ready for the next litter. Starting off you can re breed at 4 weeks after kindling wean at 6 or 7 weeks and she will be ready for the next litter to see how your stock will do hope this helps!
Hi, Ive listened to your podcasts on the human path and self sufficent gardner and have learned an amazing ammount of information. Im not sure if this is the proper place to post this question but have you ever or is there an extreme potential with rabbits to attract unwanted rodents like rats? I like in the downtown area of a small township/village and there isnt a rodent problem ive seen but I don’t want to bring one on either. THanks so much for all that you put out there for us.
Usually you get rodents from wasted feed, but with rabbits that is not a problem as it is with chickens (scratching there food around). I keep my feed bags in covered metal trash cans and feed the rabbits what they will in 20 minutes of time so no food is left for rodents, also feeding hay and greens is not a draw for rodents. Hope this answers your question!
Do you sell good breeding stock
Yes, we still raise rabbits only breeding New Zealand Whites and our special breed of blued eyed whites called Sinatra’s. We have down sized to just breeding for our own need and do have some young stock for sale at times.
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