Rabbits were the classic British backyard meat animal through both wars, for good reasons: they need very little space, they eat greens and grass rather than grain, they breed quickly, and they are quiet enough for a suburban garden.
They are also animals with legal protection and real welfare needs, and the step that turns a rabbit into food is a skill that has to be learned properly from a person. This page is honest about both.
Why rabbits
- Very small footprint. A hutch and run takes less space than a shed.
- They eat what you can grow, and the parts of it you cannot: outer leaves, weeds, grass, garden greens, hay.
- Fast turnaround. A doe can produce several litters a year, and young rabbits reach usable size in a few months.
- Quiet. No cockerel problem, and neighbours rarely object.
- Manure that can go straight on the garden. Unlike chicken manure, rabbit droppings are cold and do not need composting first, which is genuinely useful.
- Lean meat, which is also the nutritional catch: rabbit is very low in fat, and a diet relying heavily on it is a known problem. It needs to be eaten alongside a fat source. See grow for calories, not for salad, which makes the same point about fat generally.
The law and the duty of care
Keeping rabbits for meat is lawful in the UK. There is no licence for keeping them at a domestic scale.
The Animal Welfare Act 2006 applies to every animal you are responsible for, whether it is a pet or livestock, and it imposes a positive duty of care. The five needs it requires you to meet are:
- A suitable environment.
- A suitable diet.
- The ability to exhibit normal behaviour patterns.
- Appropriate company, or appropriate separation, depending on the species and the individual.
- Protection from pain, suffering, injury and disease.
Causing unnecessary suffering is an offence, and that explicitly includes an incompetent attempt at killing an animal. This is the reason for the despatch section below.
Intending to eat an animal does not reduce the standard of care owed to it while it is alive. In practice the welfare requirements are the same as for a pet rabbit.
Check your tenancy or deeds for restrictions on keeping animals.
Housing
Traditional hutches are, by modern welfare standards, generally too small. Plan around a hutch plus a permanently attached run.
Heat is the killer. Rabbits tolerate British cold well and overheat easily. Above about 25 degrees they are in trouble, and a hutch in summer sun is lethal. Shade, ventilation and a frozen bottle to lie against in a heatwave.
Company. Rabbits are social and normally do better in compatible pairs or groups, but entire males will fight seriously and unplanned breeding is immediate. Think through the grouping before you acquire animals, and get advice from an experienced keeper.
Clean regularly. Damp bedding causes respiratory problems and attracts flies. See fly strike below.
Feeding
Hay is not bedding, it is the diet. A rabbit's gut and teeth both depend on a constant supply of long fibre, and a rabbit without hay develops dental disease and gut stasis, which is frequently fatal.
Change the diet slowly. Sudden dietary change, and large quantities of unfamiliar greens, cause fatal digestive upset. Introduce anything new in small amounts over days.
Do not feed kitchen scraps. The same rule applies as to poultry: feeding catering waste, or anything that has been in a kitchen handling meat, to a farmed animal is an offence in the UK. Garden produce taken straight from the garden is fine. See keeping chickens.
Not everything green is safe. Many common garden and wild plants are toxic to rabbits, and this is a real risk when feeding foraged greens. Learn the safe list properly before you rely on forage, and when in doubt leave it out.
Water, twice a day. A rabbit without water stops eating within hours and is in serious trouble quickly.
Breeding
The reason rabbits were the wartime choice, and the part to think through in advance.
- A doe can produce several litters a year, with several young in each.
- Rabbits reach breeding age young and will breed immediately and repeatedly if a buck and a doe are kept together. Separate housing is essential unless you intend continuous breeding.
- Keep a doe and borrow or visit a buck, which is the usual small-scale arrangement and avoids housing an entire male.
- A nest box before kindling, with plenty of bedding. The doe pulls her own fur to line it.
- Leave her alone. Disturbance around kindling causes abandonment, and in some cases worse.
- Keep records: which doe, which buck, dates, litter size, how they grew. Without records you cannot select or avoid inbreeding.
- Plan the numbers. Rabbits multiply faster than most people expect, and an unplanned population is a welfare problem and a feed bill.
Health
- Vaccinate. Myxomatosis and rabbit haemorrhagic disease, including the newer variant, are widespread, extremely serious and usually fatal. Vaccination is available from a vet and is the single most important health measure.
- Fly strike is the emergency to know. Flies lay in soiled or damp fur, usually around the back end, and the larvae burrow into the living animal. It develops within a day and it is an emergency. Check every rabbit's rear end daily in warm weather, keep them clean and dry, and get veterinary help immediately if you find larvae.
- Teeth. Rabbit teeth grow continuously and are worn down by chewing hay. A rabbit that stops eating, drools or loses weight may have dental problems.
- Gut stasis. A rabbit that stops eating or passing droppings is an emergency, not a wait-and-see. It kills quickly.
- Parasites: mites, fleas and worms. Check regularly.
- Hygiene. Rabbits carry fewer zoonoses than poultry, and hand washing after handling animals, bedding or feed is still the rule, particularly for children.
Have a plan for veterinary costs before you start. A keeper who cannot afford or reach a vet is a keeper who cannot meet the duty of care.
Despatch, and why this page will not describe it
Deciding honestly before you start
Worth doing before any animal arrives, because the decision is much harder afterwards.
Ask yourself:
- Can I meet the duty of care, including the vet bill, the daily checks, the holidays and the winter mornings?
- Can I learn to despatch competently, and will I actually do it?
- Will the household eat them? A rabbit that has been named is usually not eaten, and children forming attachments is normal and should be planned for rather than resented.
- What happens to the ones I do not want? Every litter contains animals surplus to what you intended.
- Do I have somewhere to keep an entire buck, or an arrangement with somebody who does?
There is no wrong answer, and there is a wrong sequence, which is acquiring the animals and working it out afterwards.
The honest alternative is eggs. A few hens produce protein daily, need no despatch decision for years, and are easier in almost every respect. Rabbits give more meat per square metre and require you to be the person who ends an animal's life properly, repeatedly. Both are reasonable. Choose deliberately.