I was talking to Mark about rabbits. I honestly don't think we would be able to sustain them unless we fed primarily pellets. Thank you for educating us on all aspects of homesteading. 💚
Glad you enjoyed this one. Its always amazing how much any animal can and does eat given the opportunity! It certainly is where rabbits are great on a small scale but also tough in that without pellets you do have to tap into a lot of different resources to keep them well fed and productive (hands down a pellet diet is the most convenient for a lot of reasons but.... as we have seen in the last few years that dependency is not always a guarantee). Still they are a good animal for smaller spaces but may not be the best fit for all situations (something you don't hear much talk about honestly).
@@HickorycroftFarm my problem is I want to do it all! But I have to understand the logistics of what I have to work with. So far Mark hasn't pardoned anymore of our fowl lol
Maybe I misunderstood what you said but did you say that they start digging at a younger age (happens quickly)? The reason I ask is, I want to run meat rabbits in my backyard but I do not want holes dug. I live in a city. I like your system, cheap, simple with plenty of food!
We usually find they don't start digging until they get close to 6 months old. It works great for the growouts, but we ate looking into some different ideas for our breeders for next year.
So a 1/4 acre would be eaten up pretty quick. I knew I'd need to pellet feed also but was unsure how fast they would eat the "biomass". Hard to find any info on this.
Pending how many rabbits I would say yes. We have had between 12 and 16 rabbits in 3 tractors this summer on our "lawn" which is fortunately about a 1/4 acre of lush grass, clover, yarrow and a lot of other bits that they like. It worked and gave them a great moving space, but we still had to feed pellets, although less then normal amounts, to get them to a good size in a decent time frame.
We do like using the tractors but it is amazing how much they can consume in a very short timeframe. When we used them years ago that was one thing we found that if the grass/forage was short it was really only a small supplement as we just couldn't move them fast enough to keep them happy. But letting it grow like we have this year seems to really work well (though I wouldn't trust an older rabbit that might dig....)
