Two Rabbit Hunting Questions: spoilage and rabbit still breathing.

[highup]

1.When rabbit hunting when the outdoor temperatures are above 40F, what is the preferred method
for preventing spoilage ?
2.If you come across one of your rabbits that is immobilized but it still breathing, what is the preferred
thing to do if the only weapon you have is a shotgun ?

 

[Double Naught Spy]

1. Don't know
2. Carry more than just a shotgun (you are hunting and don't have a knife?) or use your bare hands. Strong thumb pressure down on the esophagus will kill the rabbit in short order, or you can snap its neck for a quicker kill.

 

[red rick]

I look for a near by stick , or stomp their head .

 

[Laphroaig]

The way that I was taught is to pick it up by the hind legs and give it a karate chop to the back of the neck. That breaks it's neck I suppose.

Field dress immediately.

 

[red rick]

If you are hunting with dogs hang the guts on a tree limb so the dogs don’t eat them . Around here rabbits are loaded with fleas and tapeworms . If your dog eats the intestines most likely they will get tapeworms and you will have to worm them with a wormer that kills tapeworms , most dog wormers don’t have that ingredient in them , Praziquantel .

 

[buck460XVR]

The way that I was taught is to pick it up by the hind legs and give it a karate chop to the back of the neck. That breaks it's neck I suppose.

Yep....quick, humane and easy. It's how we kill domestic rabbits for butchering. Generally, when you pick them up by the backs legs, they instinctively raise their head and you just deliver a blow to the back of the head where it forms the crease with their neck. It's where the term "rabbit punch" came from.

I generally only hunt rabbits when the weather is cold so that there is less chance of them still having burrowing mites and fleas on them. Even then I like to skin and gut them in the field right away so they cool. In a cloth bag works best as plastic bags tend to make them heat.

 

[Rule3]

Break it's litttle neck

 

[entropy]

1.When rabbit hunting when the outdoor temperatures are above 40F, what is the preferred method
for preventing spoilage ?
2.If you come across one of your rabbits that is immobilized but it still breathing, what is the preferred
thing to do if the only weapon you have is a shotgun ?

1. I don't hunt rabbits over 32F.

2. Step on the hind legs, hover barrel above head. Fire. Rabbit will stop breathing; or screaming, which happened when a friend gut shot a rabbit and he freaked out when it screamed, he started yelling "Make it stop, make it stop!" So I did.

 

[Patocazador]

I stomp on its head to kill it although that seldom happens.

Gut it immediately after killing it and if it's hot out, skin it too. Avoid putting it in your pouch until it is cool. Hanging them from a cord attached to your belt will cool them pretty fast.

 

[red rick]

Yep....quick, humane and easy. It's how we kill domestic rabbits for butchering. Generally, when you pick them up by the backs legs, they instinctively raise their head and you just deliver a blow to the back of the head where it forms the crease with their neck. It's where the term "rabbit punch" came from.

I generally only hunt rabbits when the weather is cold so that there is less chance of them still having burrowing mites and fleas on them. Even then I like to skin and gut them in the field right away so they cool. In a cloth bag works best as plastic bags tend to make them heat.

They have fleas on them in January and February in Virginia . Some areas that we hunt are worst with fleas on them than others .

 

[Show Me]

Grab buy the rear legs and whop the head on a tree trunk. By golly. Or shoot it with the old 45.
Takes certain temperatures for hunting small critters. Unless you must eat.
Country boys can survive.

 

[ironworkerwill]

1.When rabbit hunting when the outdoor temperatures are above 40F, what is the preferred method
for preventing spoilage ?
2.If you come across one of your rabbits that is immobilized but it still breathing, what is the preferred
thing to do if the only weapon you have is a shotgun ?

We use the squeeze method to field dress rabbit. Requires no tools just start at the ribcage and work your way to the rear of the animal, pressure will eliminate the entrails.

The easiest way to kill a wounded rabbit is to put your foot on its head.

Rabbit is an easy animal to kill, skin, butcher and cook in comparison to its crackhead cousin, the squirrel.

 

[dla]

1. Don't know
2. Carry more than just a shotgun (you are hunting and don't have a knife?) or use your bare hands. Strong thumb pressure down on the esophagus will kill the rabbit in short order, or you can snap its neck for a quicker kill.

1.When rabbit hunting when the outdoor temperatures are above 40F, what is the preferred method
for preventing spoilage ?
2.If you come across one of your rabbits that is immobilized but it still breathing, what is the preferred
thing to do if the only weapon you have is a shotgun ?

I skin them almost immediately and get them on ice or a saltwater brine with ice. Especially when using a shotgun, it is important to get the blood out of the hindquarters and backstrap and saltwater seems to help. I don't care about the front quarters.

As far as killing the wounded - I step on their head.

 

[caribou]

I only hunt Bunnies in Winter, when there's snow about, so I skin n gut them if I have to eat soon, and leave them in the skin, gutted, so they don't dry out while frozen.

I beat snared Bunnies on my snowgo ski or against my gunstock, while my wife will pinch their hearts and kill them just as fast.

Yup, the ribs are nothing to squeeze that heart to a stop.

And then theres the Bunnies that scream.........

 

[Show Me]

I only hunt Bunnies in Winter, when there's snow about, so I skin n gut them if I have to eat soon, and leave them in the skin, gutted, so they don't dry out while frozen.

I beat snared Bunnies on my snowgo ski or against my gunstock, while my wife will pinch their hearts and kill them just as fast.

Yup, the ribs are nothing to squeeze that heart to a stop.

And then theres the Bunnies that scream.........

Pinch the heart? That's the best ever. Much better than what I've always done.

 

[highup]

1. I don't hunt rabbits over 32F.

2. Step on the hind legs, hover barrel above head. Fire. Rabbit will stop breathing; or screaming, which happened when a friend gut shot a rabbit and he freaked out when it screamed, he started yelling "Make it stop, make it stop!" So I did.

Is there anything you will hunt over 32F (besides coyotes or other things that people don't eat).

 

[entropy]

These days pheasants and deer is about it, but in my younger years, yes, quite a few game animals and birds.

 

[brewer12345]

Wounded rabbits, jacks and squirrels generally get a .22, 38, 9mm, or in one case a 45 colt to the head from a pistol. I find .22 to be light for jacks.

 

[Gbro]

Pinch the heart? That's the best ever. Much better than what I've always done.

Foot on the ribcage will take a couple minutes and will "pinch the heart" and the lungs simultaneously ending any noise.

 

[stonebuster]

I was taught to put your foot on the head behind the ears, grab the hind legs and pull. Head comes off easily. I was also told not to shoot a sitting rabbit before the first snow because of "rabbit fever". Theory was a sick rabbit wouldn't run & if infected wouldn't last after the first snow. They said you could tell by their liver if it was infected. The rabbit disease could've been an " old wives tale" but I took the advice of the locals.

 

[red rick]

All the rabbits that we shoot are running . They have hounds chasing them and we have a rule ( for sport and with most of us it’s more about the run than the kill ) that you cannot shoot until the dogs have circled 1 time . For those that don’t rabbit hunt , a rabbits usually circles back to where he was jumped .

 

[Show Me]

Foot on the ribcage will take a couple minutes and will "pinch the heart" and the lungs simultaneously ending any noise.

That fellas wife has it happening. As in pinching the heart.

 

[.308 Norma]

Carry more than just a shotgun (you are hunting and don't have a knife?)

+1

 

[nettlle]

I was taught a karate chop to the back of the head also where the spine connects to the skull. When I was trapping muskrats I would dispatch them with a rap to the back of the head in the same place with my wire cutters. Doesn't take much.

 

[highup]

I tried this method of gutting. Apparently this is how the American Indians used to do it.
Either my hands were not strong enough (probably) or my technique was off, but I
could not do it.

How to clean and gut a rabbit without a knife

Have you ever wondered how to clean a rabbit without a knife and keep the meat clean for travel? This video is meant just for you.

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