Thread: To gut/skin or not to gut/skin when out in the field?

Bunny skinning is quick and easy and much easier if you do it straight away rather than letting the animal cool down. You can get the guts out as MD describes, or prepare gutless which I prefer. Back legs off, backstraps off and front legs off. Most of the meat is on the back legs, so if I'm shooting a lot of rabbits, I only take the back legs (sadly, that opportunity has closed for me, boohoo!). As with all wild game meat, best to store in a fly-proof, breathable bag. A pillow case is ideal.

Originally Posted by Micky Duck

slice across back..grab both sides of skin and pull outwards,skin will slip off easy enough, hold bunny by back legs,slice across top of belly flap,reverse bunny so your holding head end,give a good flick and 80% of the gutting job is now done too. let it cool off BEFORE putting in plastic bag. the sooner you skin it,the easier it is to do. laid on clean grass to air out/cool down it will come to no harm unless flies are about. you can fit 50 skinned n gutted bunnies in a 75ltr canvas frame pack...you wont be jogging with that amount onboard I can state that as fact.....give pack a good hose out when get home and all is good.
garden siccatears make short work of chopping off feet, the head will twist off easy enough.

We used large side cutters as they were smaller than secateurs but other than that - spot on. And as MB says below, the only real bits of meat are the drum sticks and the back straps so you can pull these without gutting and save carrying lots of weight (depending on how many you get.....)

We used to retrieve lots in the 90s for petfood so we just bundled the animals in bags and stopped and gutted them in bundles.

Originally Posted by MB

Bunny skinning is quick and easy and much easier if you do it straight away rather than letting the animal cool down. You can get the guts out as MD describes, or prepare gutless which I prefer. Back legs off, backstraps off and front legs off. Most of the meat is on the back legs, so if I'm shooting a lot of rabbits, I only take the back legs (sadly, that opportunity has closed for me, boohoo!). As with all wild game meat, best to store in a fly-proof, breathable bag. A pillow case is ideal.