Rabbits!

Raising rabbits was so much fun! I always wanted rabbits was not allowed to as a child. One of our neighbors had a bard and was raising rabbits commercially. He had about one hundred does female rabbits, and five bucks male rabbits. She was shipping fifty to one hundred out each week.

I could not afford cages as I was unemployed at the time, so I bartered work for cages and stock (bunnies). I started with New Zeeland Whites; then we got the kids into 4-H and had Rex, Satins, French Lops, Holland Lops (mini lops) and were busy caring for bunnies! We shipped some rabbit on our own, and could pay for feed. We traded bunnies for other breeds.

My daughter cleaned under pens sacking up fertilizer and sold in town by the sack. She had some customers who would take all we could deliver! We changed to buckets and broke the price down when we ran out of sacks. Rabbit fertilizer can go directly on plants with out harming them. (This is one of the secrets to the way things thrived in my yard then amazing the neighbors at the way things grew in our yard they thought we could grow anything.)

We later got angoras. I got a spinning wheel and learn to spin on angora clippings, We entered rabbits in the local county fairs, as newspapers daily deliver routes kept us close to home. I’ve entered wool and angora yarns, I’d spun up that was much easier than animals to feed and water twice daily I learned.

I’ve enjoyed French Angora rabbits. We had a quite a collection of colors. The children learned a lot raising rabbits. It was great therapy, we felt better after feeding and caring for them. These give me warm fuzzy memories. I have pictures of the kids with their bunnies and ribbons and trophies they won fitting and showing rabbits at the fair.

(Adapted from a Pre-web article I did for a rabbit trade magizine in 1988.)