Commercial Meat Rabbit Growth Rates

To raise meat rabbits economically, growth rate is very important. Rabbits from good meat lines give you more meat in less time on less feed. Some show rabbits take forever to grow and eat a ton.

Quality breeding stock from thrifty lines quickly pay for themselves in feed savings alone. Purchase rabbits from a breeder who keeps good records. If they can’t tell you what their kits weigh at 8 weeks, look elsewhere. I prefer kits to weigh about 4 pounds at 8 weeks. At minimum they should weigh 5 pounds by 10-12 weeks.

Good Meat Rabbit Bloodlines

What are good meat lines? They are rabbits that have been selected over generations for fast growth rate, thriftiness, and good meaty body type. The resulting offspring tend to be uniform fast growers. A quality commercial meat rabbit will have small to medium bone. Foot size is a good indicator. When selecting breeders, look for ones with smaller/narrower feet. Large wide feet indicate big bone.

To raise rabbits for meat, choose a large “commercial” rabbit breed with fine bone structure. These rabbits produce fast growing offspring with a good meat to bone ratio, usually 60-65% dress-out rate. Adults usually weigh 8-12 pounds at maturity.

Don’t make the mistake of adding large boned rabbits (such as Flemish Giants) to your breeding program to try to increase growth rates. If you do, you may get 5# fryers at 8 weeks, but they will have hardly any meat on their huge frames. They’ll eat you out of house and home before they have enough meat to justify butchering at 5-6 months old. Remember, rabbits grow bone before they put on meat.

New Zealand and Californian rabbits are the top breeds raised for commercial production. The have been selected for large litter size and fast growth.

Personally, I feel that heritage breeds are better suited to backyards and small farms. Click to view the Top 10 Meat Rabbit Breeds for the homestead. We raise Champagne d’Argents. They have more manageable litter sizes (6-8 kits), sweet temperaments, and are good mothers to their kits. Our Champagnes weigh 4 pounds at 8 weeks and reach fryer weight (5#) by 9-10 weeks. Dark eye color also makes them better candidates for raising outdoors as opposed to Californians and New Zealands which have pink or red eyes.

Meat Rabbit Growth Rate Chart

This chart shows the ideal meat rabbit growth rates for commercial rabbit breeds such as Californians, New Zealands, and Champagne d’Argents. Use these guidelines to see how your stock measures up. Weight is shown in pounds.

Age	Good Growth	Excellent Growth
6 weeks	2.7 lbs.	3-3.25 lbs.
8 weeks	3.5 lbs.	4-4.5 lbs.
10 weeks	5 lbs.	5.5-6 lbs.
12 weeks	6 lbs.	6.5-7 lbs.
16 weeks	7 lbs.	7.5-8.5 lbs.

Invest in a good-quality scale to weigh your rabbits (like this one). I put a carpet square on top and weigh kits at 8 weeks and 12 weeks. A scale also allows you to accurately monitor the health and condition of adult rabbits. Pedigree weight of breeding stock is taken at one year.

At a minimum, you should know the weight of your breeders and 8-week old kits. If you want to weigh more often, our Litter Growth Record has space to record weights every 2 weeks from 4-16 weeks. I used these early on when I was trying to get my growth rates up. It allowed me to better understand the growth patterns of my lines. Here’s an example filled out. Now that my kits consistently hit 4 pounds by 8 weeks, I just weigh at 8 and 12 weeks and record the info on ‘Rabbit Tattoo Log’ sheets from our Rabbitry Records Binder.

NOTE: After a couple generations of selective breeding, I was able to get my Champagne kits to 4.5-5 pounds by 8 weeks, which is considered top growth rates for New Zealands. However, I found that those kits had less disease resistance and were more likely to get sore hocks. I realized I had pushed the growth rate too far. Just like broiler chickens, if they grow too fast, they do so at the expense of their overall health. Once I realized this, I backed off the growth rate. I like to see my kits weigh about 4 pounds at 8 weeks. A little less is fine if it was a big litter.

Hybrid Vigor

A discussion about meat rabbit growth rates would not be complete without mentioning hybrid vigor. If you breed 2 purebred commercial rabbits of different breeds (for example a Californian buck & a New Zealand doe), you get hybrid vigor in the first generation. Those kits will grow fast and be ready to dress out very quickly – assuming the parents are from good meat lines.

A familiar example of hybrid vigor is commercial broiler chickens. Broiler chicks are the result of crossing purebred Cornish with white rock chickens. The resulting chicks grow rapidly and are ready for butcher faster than any other breeds. However, broiler chickens often suffer health problems due to their rapid growth rate. Heart and joint problems are common as well as weak immune systems.

Never make the mistake of saving fast-growing hybrid kits to use as replacement breeders. All of the vigor gained in the first generation is deducted from the second generation. That is why this is often called a “terminal cross”. Crossbred kits from purebred parents are raised strictly for meat and all of them should end up in the freezer.

HYBRID VIGOR PROS: Fast growth rates. It may be easier to put together unrelated pairs of parent stock. Pairing rabbits for hybrid vigor may be a good choice if you raise rabbits strictly for commercial meat production.

HYBRID VIGOR CONS: You can’t perpetuate the herd from your starter rabbits. You need to purchase purebred replacement breeding stock. Since you are only raising one generation, you lose the ability to select for better strains over time. It is critical that you start with rabbits from good meat lines or they will have nothing to contribute to the offspring.

Can you push growth rates too far?

Can you get kits that weigh 5 pounds by 8 weeks? Yes, but realize that it comes at a cost. If your sole purpose is to raise fast-growing fryers for meat, consider using hybrid vigor terminal cross stated above.

If you’re raising purebred rabbits or a heritage breed like Champagnes, don’t go crazy trying to make the breed be like modern animals that gain really fast. If you do, you may lose some of the valuable disease resistance and hardiness traits.

All things should be done with respect to balance and the whole. the whole picture in mind.

“Bad things always happen when an animal is overselected for any single trait. Nature will give you a nasty surprise.”

― Temple Grandin

You can increase growth rates by genetics alone. This is the safest and most reliable way to do so. weed out slow growers. Keep your faster growers for breeders. Once you’re getting the growth rates you want, don’t keep saving your fastest growing kits for breeders or you may push the growth rates too far. Paring a biggest,fastest grower, with a biggest fastest grower will produce rabbits with big boneIf you do this you may inadvertently start breeding towards rabbits with bigger bone (like Flemish). You want fast-growing meaty kits with fine to medium bone. For example: Now that my growth rates are up, I pair a fast-growing doe (who weighed 4.25 pounds at 8 weeks) with a medium growth buck (who weighed 3.8 pounds at 8 weeks) and has finer bone (smaller feet).

What about supplements?

I regularly see people mention feeding calf manna or other “treats” to boost growth rates.

As such, I don’t recommend supplementing Mom & kits with growth supplements like calf manna. Calm manna contains GMO corn & soybeans – both of which are bad for rabbits. Though it temporarily increased growth rates, I started getting deformities, stillbirths, and health issues in subsequent litters. I stopped feeding it and my does returned to healthy normal litters.

Good meat bloodlines are the key. Our purebred Champagnes are wide meaty rabbits that grow fast on minimal feed (5# by 9-10 weeks). We don’t push them to grow this fast either. They just get 16% protein pellets, free choice hay, and greens/weeds from the yard spring/summer/fall. We have selectively bred them to be thrifty easy keepers. Slow growers, ones with big bone, or huge appetites were culled.

More info on judging quality meat rabbits:

Selecting Meat Rabbit Breeding Stock
Posing Commercial Breed Meat Rabbits
Printable Rabbit Records Binder

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How do your meat rabbit growth rates measure up? Do you cross purebred rabbits for hybrid vigor? Tell us about it below…