How to skin and butcher a rabbit
On our Bushcraft courses we teach game preparation and get students to prep their own food so they know how to, should the need ever arise in the wilderness.
This is a walk through guide on how to skin and butcher a rabbit for food. You can learn more techniques like this by signing up to a Wildway Bushcraft course. Using this method will also allow you to keep the pelt in the most useful condition so you can use it for making items such as slippers and bags.
We will start at the point where you have got your hands on a rabbit. Assuming the rabbit looks fit and healthy, you will need to kill it.
You will want to do this as quickly and as painlessly as possible, showing the utmost respect to the animal. You are aiming for a humane dispatch, this can be achieved by giving the rabbit two sharp strong blows to the back of its head. This can be done with either your hand in a chopping motion or by using a good solid round of timber. Take your time and be firm to ensure you get it right the first time. To check the rabbit is dead, check the corneal reflex. You do this by poking the animal in the eye. If you get any reaction from the eye, the rabbit is not dead. If this is the case, hit it again, hard.
So we now have a dead, healthy looking rabbit. Now what?
Empty the bladder of the animal by pushing down on the rabbits belly and moving downwards as you do so. You may see urine being expelled; if the rabbit went to the loo before you caught it you may not!
Take a knife, place the rabbit on its back and using the tip of your knife, carefully cut upwards from the rabbits belly button area to its ribcage. Be careful not to nick the rabbits guts, this is a sure fire way to taint the meat.
Once you have made the cut, use your hand to remove the offal and guts of the rabbit. Good. Job done!
Now snap the rabbits back legs at what would be the knee on a human. Once you have broken the bone cut it off with your knife.
Do the same with the front paws. You now have 4 lucky rabbits feet!
Turning the rabbit on its back, use your fingers to separate the skin from the meat. Keep pulling and working the skin away until you have got to its back. Now do the same from the other side. You will now have a rabbit hand bag!
Continue removing the skin towards the back legs and pull the skin off the back legs. This can be quite tough so be firm.
Once you have done this, do the same with the front. Again be firm and and it will come off.
You should at this point have a naked rabbit with its own fur as a cloak. Remove any last bits of skin until you are up to the neck area. When you are, firmly twist off the head and pull it away. You will now be left with a rabbit hand puppet.
Using your knife, cut the shoulders off of the rabbit. They are not attached by a bone or joint so they will come off easily.
Next, spread the hind legs and break the ball and socket joint. Cut the animals “bottom” out using a V shape cut where the tail was. This will remove the anal passage and any droppings yet to be passed plus the scent glands which if left in can smell foul when the meat is cooking. When you have done this, you will be able to cut off the legs at the joint just as you did with the front legs.
Remove the skirts from the animal – these can be turned into rabbit jerky by adding salt and drying them out over the smoke of your fire. You will now be able to break the spine just after the rib cage and cut through the rabbit to remove the loins – these are the best bits in my opinion!
Use the ribs to create a stock and slowly boil up the joints to create a rabbit stew.
I hope you found this useful. If you wish to learn more about game prep and other bushcraft skills then check out our bushcraft courses held in Dorset and Hampshire.
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Cheers for the refresher lessons, as I said not done this since I was about 14. Alway feels a bit strange asking the butcher to do it when I used to. Can now get back to self skinning them and always good to teach / remind friends where food comes from at the next bbq .
thanks Jon
Glad you enjoyed it Justin, Great it helped you out!
It leaves you with a strange feeling to see an animal’s life taken in such a brutal way as if we humans went through this ordeal it would really be creepy… but the circle of life is designed in such a way that we all need to be sustained. Being a vegetarian is not always practical as if hard times hit you may not have the resources to grow anything. Learning to survive on what can be available is an essential part of existence.
This is a sacred situation where one life is given to sustain another. It seems very important to know and understand this essential skill if it is needed.
Thank you for teaching and sharing such a delicate subject.
Thank you for your comment, you are right, learning how to process meat in the wild is an essential skill. Glad you enjoyed the read.
For this “lesson” a life had to been taken?
We do not live in the wild.
You can buy your meat in supermarket, cut and packed in plastic.
We are no hunters anymore. We don’t need to hunt anymore. When you go out in the wild just take some breads with you.
Because of the lifestyles in the west tons of animals get tortured, tormented and murdered in such an wasteful amount.
You, people who still seem to love nature and wildlife should protect the little wild life we have left. Too many animals get extinct every year.
Please don’t kill more than necessary.
Thanks.
I am absolutely disgusted at the fact that a life had to be taken for this purpose! How uncivilized is it to kill and butcher an animal when we don’t live in the wilderness and have fresh foods to eat in a grocery store! There are many dietery options which don’t involve the taking of lives! It is just bloody creepy to me to see an article like this…
Hahaha Laila,
Killing and eating your own food is the only way truly appreciate the value of what you are taking versus what you are gaining.
If you think its uncivilized go vegetarian, but there are quite a few butchers that you have offended out there.
Poor Rabbit )-:
RIP
Too many tree huggers here! Why would any of you read this? Do you not understand “bushcraft”?
And to those of you saying we dont need to kill animals to eat when the grocery stores have all the food you need…are you kidding me? You dont think the beef steaks (cows), slab of ribs (pig), or even an omelet (unborn chicken ie eggs) were once LIVE ANIMALS and one point?
Get a grip or become a vegan…btw if you plant a garden you will be clearing the land first and probably displacing a rabbit or 2 yourself…damn murderer!!
Just go to the supermarket to get your meat where no animals were harmed…LMFAO
Thank you for the very well-written instructions. I’m sorry you have a bunch of Karens saying it’s inhumane.
Why would you kill an animal when you can just go buy meat at the store. Why ethically kill an animal instead of getting it from a meat factory where animals are often subject to little or no sunlight like we do!