Processing a fluffy bunny into meat (WARNING, the title says it all!!!)

Here goes!

Well, THAT didnt work!

My tools for rabbit processing (not including the .22 I use to dispatch them) The two bowls of ice are for meat and the skin. A knife sharpener keeps a keen edge on my paring knife and the pruning shears are for cutting bones. I just tie the rabbit to the gambrel (sp?) but its tops for bigger things so thought I would show it too.



Here is the bunny in my kill cage. Its set on the ground so very little chance of the bullet bouncing off something and hurting me. I let her/him settle down in the cage and then gently put the barrel of my .22 right above her head, between her eyes and ears. Then I pull the trigger. Only once have I missed my shot, the rabbit turned its head just as I pulled the trigger. Both of us were quite surprised, it by the noise, me by the live rabbit looking up at me A pile of grass or food will usually keep its interest long enough to get a good shot. There are other ways to kill rabbits and I will be experimenting with some of them one day but so far the .22 hasn't failed me.





Here the rabbit has been dispatched and I have cut carefully around the back legs to expose the tendons. I will push a length of cord between the tendon and the bone and tie it to my gambrel or it can be hung or tied to most anything that will allow it to hang at a convenient working height. I count myself very lucky that my hubby had an engine hoist that I can use to raise or lower the animal I am working on.



Here the rabbit is with throat cut to bleed out (although I find a .22 head shot rabbit mostly bleeds out long before I get to this stage) and hung up to work on.




Here I have made one long cut at the back of the legs and gently peeled down to expose the leg meat. I take the skin off in one single piece. Its supposed to make curing the skin easier but as I haven't done that bit yet the jury is still out. I do know it reduces cut areas so loose fur isn't as much of a problem as when I cut the skin down the belly and inside of the legs. Around the tail and anus is a bit tricky so I just cut around the area, leaving the tail and what nots in place.

I gently pull down on the skin cutting any tough bits loose to get to the front legs.



The front legs are a bit fiddly. By pulling down you will get enough loose to get your fingers around the leg. BE CAREFUL you don't just pull the leg right off the body, you want the skin off at this stage, not the entire leg



Here both front legs are free as is the neck. Next is to cut the skin all the way free of the body and wash it very VERY well in cold water and leave to soak in ice water till your done with the rest of it.



This one isn't too clear - sorry - but what I have done here is every so carefully cut down the belly and then to gently feel where the pelvic bone goes OVER the intestines. Once I have the bone placement I take my pruners and cut both side of the bone free. That way I can cut the tail and remaining fur around the anus free and just pull the entire thing through the opening I made in the bone. That way I have no poo getting loose and very little, if any, pee spillage.



After getting the back end of the guts free I gently (don't get tired of the word GENTLY as without gentleness, you get gut contents on your hands ) pull the guts out and let them hang free over my gut bucket. My goal is to get the icky bits free of the good bits. I keep the heart, liver and kidneys. Everything else goes in the discard bucket.




And here it is, all clean and ready to be cut loose of the hanger.

And here we go, all cut up and in the bowl of ice. As it was 91f when I was doing this rabbit the ice had mostly melted into ice water but no harm in that. Just be sure to get it OUT of the water as soon as you can. You don't want the flavor of the meat leaching into the water.

As I was taking the pictures myself I didn't get the cutting up bit but what I do is to cut the front legs off first. They come off easily if you cut between the body and the shoulder blades. Then I cut the spine into two pieces, first using the knife to cut between the ribs and then the pruners to cut the spine. Then I cut the back legs off of the pelvic bone. Just cut down to the hip socket and then pop the bone free. All you are left with then is the pelvic bone which is tiny but still worth going into the stock pot. I think many people cut them up differently but that's what I do.

So there it is, start to finish about 20 min.

polgara wrote:

My skill is non existant when it comes to this sort of thing Had to get hubby to show me AGAIN how to post pickies!

Seems to have worked the second time

Very interesting GB.

The method I use is slightly different. I don't use a spreader bar for starters and as I am a.) preserving the pelts and b.) generally doing 20-30 rabbits at a time the need for speed is essential.

Also, hunting wild rabbits, paunching is done in the field as soon as possible after death because the heat of the innards will cause the meat to spoil in short order if left until the haul is home

First off I cut very carefully around the anus then pull the sphincter clear of the carcass by a couple of inches to avoid faecal contamination, then a straight slit from stem to stern and pull the rest of the intestines clear. I separate heart and liver and leave the rest on the ground for whatever comes along to eat it.

To skin it, I make a short slit from the centre about halfway up each rear leg then peel the fur off the legs and snap the foot off intact. Then pull the whole thing down the carcass much as you do and repeat for the front legs. If it is a fine specimen I may peel the head in one piece, slicing off each ear at the base, but this is time consuming and the result looks faintly ghoulish so i usually just chop the head off at the top of the neck, then split it with a cleaver to remove the brain for use in tanning.



Paunching in the field takes about two minutes. Skinning takes about three assuming I am not keeping the head. Although the wild rabbits I am taking are probably half the size of your reared bunnies. AHrvetsing the meat from the carcass perhaps another five minutes a go.

My need for speed is pretty high too Billy but as I am only doing one at a time or two at most, its just the heat and mosquitoes I am rushing to get out of

Honey Bunny should be (fingers crossed) bringing her kits above ground in two to three weeks so a bit more rabbit processing practice in the Autumn

Billy, how do you process your skins?

AH, well I am still learning on the fur-tanning process - I will post a pictorial with the next batch.
I have been brain tanning them, as the rabbits mainly come with brains (although some head shot ones don't... ) and I don't want to be playing with sulphuric acid around the kids.
I pin the skins out and scrape off as much extraneous tissue and membrane as possible - this is a fairly hardcore task as the membrane does not want to peel away nicely in one piece. Or even in many pieces. Then I salt them for a couple of days before smearing with brain paste. Then I gently sponge the dried brain off again and the skin is 'cured' but tough. It is then a matter of working it for hours and hours and hours and hours over a piece of wood to break the leather and make it nice and supple. I use a baseball bat.
So far I have had mixed success. Most of the rabbits I take are fairly young, because we are in the first instance taking them for food and want tender meat. Young wild rabbits tend to be quite small and the skin is very thin. This makes it very easy to tear the skin or scrape off too much causing the fur to shed. Other skins seem to shed all their fur for no apparent reason - I can have two seemingly identical ones being processed together and treated in exactly the same way and one will keep its fur and the other shed. I have been experimenting with smoking the skins to set the fur but advice online is conflicting as to whether to do this pre or post tanning.
I would say of about 20 skins I have tanned so far I have perhaps 4 I am proud of with no holes or tears or bald patches, although it is a steep learning curve and I am getting better at it. Also, as I am using my furs for a rope blanket it doesn't matter too much if they have the odd dink - once they are rolled into rope you can't tell the difference.
Where I have kept feet and ears on the skins I pack them in bicarb to dry out which seems to work well.

Seeing Billy's photo reminds me of the day at DD1's primary school when one of the boys was selling lucky rabbits' feet...ears...and all sorts of other lucky bits. At lunchtime the Head went round with a bucket collecting all the lucky bits and pieces and the young entrepreneur had to pay all the money back!!

Dandelion wrote:Seeing Billy's photo reminds me of the day at DD1's primary school when one of the boys was selling lucky rabbits' feet...ears...and all sorts of other lucky bits. At lunchtime the Head went round with a bucket collecting all the lucky bits and pieces and the young entrepreneur had to pay all the money back!!

Thats a bit harsh! Why did the Head take them off the kids?

Worried they might all get PTSD? from the eyes following them?

WTF do I know? It all seems mad to me....I used to have a lucky rabbit foot, and my mum had a rabbit tail powder puff to use in her powder compact.......

different times, I guess...

They were probably fresh(ish) and the head could envisage rotting heads being left in desks

Yes - sorry, didn't explain properly: there was rather more blood on the lucky appendages than is normal

Dandelion wrote:Yes - sorry, didn't explain properly: there was rather more blood on the lucky appendages than is normal

Ah yes, that would make a difference