2 PRACTICAL RABBIT KEEPING 



of wild rabbits, large numbers of which are 

 always offered every winter. When this was 

 discovered the bottom dropped out of the 

 boom and rabbits which had been worth fifty 

 dollars one day were worth hardly five the 

 next. The public was not ready for rabbit 

 meat as a steady diet at that time, as other 

 kinds of meat, including poultry, were com- 

 paratively cheap and plentiful. 



Nevertheless, a large number of people con- 

 tinued to keep rabbits in a small way, some 

 of them because they had become fond of the 

 meat and found they could produce it at very 

 low cost, and others because they enjoyed mak- 

 ing pets of the handsome little animals. Now 

 another and healthier development of the 

 industry is being felt all over the land, fostered 

 to a great extent by the high cost of living. 

 Rabbit meat is the cheapest meat that can be 

 raised, not excepting poultry. It is meat of 

 excellent quality, too, and can be prepared for 

 the table in many ways. 



Many of the advertisements in regard to the 

 remarkable fecundity of the rabbit are mis- 

 leading yet it is a fact that the animals, mul- 

 tiply very rapidly. A doe can have five litters 



