Newsworthy Articles

Rabbit Farming in Haiti

I thought this one was neat.
Texas Professor Teaches Rabbit Farming In Haiti. 

Haiti is not a country that is very well-off.  It's been hit by political unrest, poverty, natural disasters and what not.   Finding enough food for people to eat is rather important.

From the article:

The project's aim is to help numerous impoverished residents in Haiti — the poorest country in the Western Hemisphere — by training them to build their own rabbit hutches and raise rabbits as a source of meat and extra income for families, many of whom still live in tent cities.

Many Haitians moved to rural areas after the earthquake that killed an estimated 300,000, deeming it safer than living in cities, Lukefahr said. Most of the men stayed behind in the cities to work, while the women and children moved to the country with little to eat.

"The project in Haiti is exploding right now," said Lukefahr, who currently serves as the World Rabbit Science Association's general secretary for developing countries. "We started with 100 families in the beginning and now we have grown to thousands each month who are adopting rabbit production, and they realize the benefit in just a few months."

Lukefahr said farmers have grown to embrace the rabbit projects and residents have become more willing to raise rabbits and consume the meat on a regular basis. To date, Haiti's regions have more than 1,700 rabbit producers, with a 142 percent increase in the number of breeding rabbits, according to a university news release.

The average increase in monthly income from rabbit sales in the last two and half years is $19.55 per family, Lukefahr reported in his presentation, with some earning more than $200 a month from sales.

"Families can recover faster with a species like rabbits, which can be harvested at an early age and eats grass and garden wastes," Lukefahr said, adding that rabbits are becoming popular here and abroad as a low-cost food source. "A cow or a goat has to be older when you harvest them and they don't produce much offspring, and when you have an emergency like the earthquake in Haiti you need something that can produce food fast."

Read more: http://www.timesunion.com/news/texas/article/Texas-professor-teaches-rabbit-farming-in-Haiti-4100928.php#ixzz2FJVyxbsK

New England Cottontails

 9 endangered rabbits sent to NH.
see quote below:

 -- Nine rabbits considered an endangered species in New Hampshire are now calling the state home.

The nine New England cottontails were born in a captive-breeding facility at the Roger Williams Zoo in Rhode Island earlier this year.

They are spending the winter in a special outdoor pen in Newington, N.H., and will transition to life in the wild.

Once common throughout the Northeast, the New England cottontail population has decreased dramatically over the past half century as development of land and natural forest growth have cut into its available habitat.

How Rabbits can Save the World.

Have to admit, when I saw this heading I thought... how can rabbits save the world?     If you want to learn more.. go here.    here's a glimpse. 

It is a fact universally acknowledged that rabbits reproduce at a rapid rate. But did you know that rabbit meat is kosher, halal and acceptable for Hindus who decline beef for religious reasons? All of that is good news for the world-wide war on hunger—if bad news for bunnies.

Dr. Steven Lukefahr has been an avid advocate of rabbit-raising ever since his parents showed him how to raise them for the family dinner table as a young boy. He has spent his career touting rabbit as a solution for protein-energy malnutrition in the developing world. Rabbits, Lukefahr points out, are easy to raise, procreate, er, like rabbits , are relatively disease-free, more easily digestible than some other proteins, are low-fat and have a pleasant taste. While wild rabbits are a little gamier, domestic rabbits taste—okay–a lot like chicken and can be adapted to a wide variety of international culinary tastes.

Read more: http://world.time.com/2012/12/14/how-rabbits-can-save-the-world-it-aint-pretty/#ixzz2FJXU4Bev