Rabbit Gunnin’

I dont know about you guys, but the birds are not for me. We have about 10 beagles that are all ARHA registered, and in December-March theres not much i like to do more than go out and gun some bunnies. We hunt both cottontails and snowshoe hare up here in WI. Cottontails are for the weekends when we want to relax, but snowshoes are the way to go if you want quantity and excitement. Theres no limit on snowshoes here in WI so we’ll shoot till we’re blue in the face. Any bird hunter would love to hunt rabbits and almost every hunter i’ve ever talked to had a beagle at sometime or another. Once i get some pics from this year i’ll be sure to post ’em. Take care.

Hey pirate, Thats why i started loading my own shells. We hunt an area where in some winters the cottontails are so thick thier crossing the tracks in front of us coming to our side only 40 yrds ahead of us after we had just shot only a few seconds befor. Shooting in thick brush with rabbits running everywhere is about as fun as it gets but im going to give ducks and geese a try for more excitement. A one second shot alot of times is all you get. With an auto its really fun, 4 boxes of shells a day with three guys is using the old shoulder. Theres been plenty of days we had to leave our hunting coats on the ground because they were to heavy to wear anymore, picking them back up after we came back on our way to our car. I know what you mean, getting enough of them too make summer sausage, never tried it but i know the rabbits are there plus for the frying pan too. Brown them good then add a can of golden cream of mushroom soup and onions, let simmer with a lid on the skillet, then over baked potatoes, good eating!

Hey pirate, Thats why i started loading my own shells. We hunt an area where in some winters the cottontails are so thick thier crossing the tracks in front of us coming to our side only 40 yrds ahead of us after we had just shot only a few seconds befor. Shooting in thick brush with rabbits running everywhere is about as fun as it gets but im going to give ducks and geese a try for more excitement. A one second shot alot of times is all you get. With an auto its really fun, 4 boxes of shells a day with three guys is using the old shoulder. Theres been plenty of days we had to leave our hunting coats on the ground because they were to heavy to wear anymore, picking them back up after we came back on our way to our car. I know what you mean, getting enough of them too make summer sausage, never tried it but i know the rabbits are there plus for the frying pan too. Brown them good then add a can of golden cream of mushroom soup and onions, let simmer with a lid on the skillet, then over baked potatoes, good eating!

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I dont know about you guys, but the birds are not for me. We have about 10 beagles that are all ARHA registered, and in December-March theres not much i like to do more than go out and gun some bunnies. We hunt both cottontails and snowshoe hare up here in WI. Cottontails are for the weekends when we want to relax, but snowshoes are the way to go if you want quantity and excitement. Theres no limit on snowshoes here in WI so we’ll shoot till we’re blue in the face. Any bird hunter would love to hunt rabbits and almost every hunter i’ve ever talked to had a beagle at sometime or another. Once i get some pics from this year i’ll be sure to post ’em. Take care.

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I’m in. When do you want to go? LOL

Gator Hunter

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I dont know about you guys, but the birds are not for me. We have about 10 beagles that are all ARHA registered, and in December-March theres not much i like to do more than go out and gun some bunnies. We hunt both cottontails and snowshoe hare up here in WI. Cottontails are for the weekends when we want to relax, but snowshoes are the way to go if you want quantity and excitement. Theres no limit on snowshoes here in WI so we’ll shoot till we’re blue in the face. Any bird hunter would love to hunt rabbits and almost every hunter i’ve ever talked to had a beagle at sometime or another. Once i get some pics from this year i’ll be sure to post ’em. Take care.

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I’m in. When do you want to go? LOL

Gator Hunter

We have a couple spots that we like to go to. One spot is grown up CRP pine trees right next to my house that is littered with rabbits and it’s an easy walk back to the house for lunch if you want it. It’s a big field and the trees are so tall now that we put up 4 or 5 ladder stands just so we can see to shoot! that is a pretty fun time i tell ya.

i have another kinda secret spot that we dont go to much, but the first time i was there i had a broken foot, so i hobbled out in the snow with my wooden shoe and a rubber boot around it. i stood on a cut-off stump in the middle of this clear-cut and 2 guy’s worth of rabbits in about 2 hours, with no misses. They were running all over and all i was doing was shooting in self defense. We had 4 guys along that day and limited out on cottontails(3 a peice) in about 2 hours. With my bad wheel i had to have someone have someone help me haul all the rabbits out of the woods.

we sometimes shoot so many rabbits in a season that we have to make up new ways to eat rabbit, anyways here’s all the ways WE eat it: fried, rabbit stew, sweet and sour rabbit, rabbit fettuccini, rabbit hotdish, and just about every other food that you would substitute wild game in for the meat. Cottontails are better tasting than the hare cause all the hare eat are the bark and buds off of the bottom of birch trees in those paper tree clearcuts…they start to taste kinda woody later in the season.

by the by, if you’ve never run a dog on snowshoe hare you’d think they were chasing deer cause those hare run mile circles and wont hole up for hours no matter how far ahead of the dogs they are. good times.

We have a couple spots that we like to go to. One spot is grown up CRP pine trees right next to my house that is littered with rabbits and it’s an easy walk back to the house for lunch if you want it. It’s a big field and the trees are so tall now that we put up 4 or 5 ladder stands just so we can see to shoot! that is a pretty fun time i tell ya.

i have another kinda secret spot that we dont go to much, but the first time i was there i had a broken foot, so i hobbled out in the snow with my wooden shoe and a rubber boot around it. i stood on a cut-off stump in the middle of this clear-cut and 2 guy’s worth of rabbits in about 2 hours, with no misses. They were running all over and all i was doing was shooting in self defense. We had 4 guys along that day and limited out on cottontails(3 a peice) in about 2 hours. With my bad wheel i had to have someone have someone help me haul all the rabbits out of the woods.

we sometimes shoot so many rabbits in a season that we have to make up new ways to eat rabbit, anyways here’s all the ways WE eat it: fried, rabbit stew, sweet and sour rabbit, rabbit fettuccini, rabbit hotdish, and just about every other food that you would substitute wild game in for the meat. Cottontails are better tasting than the hare cause all the hare eat are the bark and buds off of the bottom of birch trees in those paper tree clearcuts…they start to taste kinda woody later in the season.

by the by, if you’ve never run a dog on snowshoe hare you’d think they were chasing deer cause those hare run mile circles and wont hole up for hours no matter how far ahead of the dogs they are. good times.

Our limit on rabbits is 10 a day per person down here, Between 3 guys and a dog thats alot of rabbits. Sometimes you walk without seeing very many then you get into the honeyhole thats covered with rabbits. Its alomst one shot after another. The trails are worn down just like deer trails sometimes and plumb full of big rabbits.

Our limit on rabbits is 10 a day per person down here, Between 3 guys and a dog thats alot of rabbits. Sometimes you walk without seeing very many then you get into the honeyhole thats covered with rabbits. Its alomst one shot after another. The trails are worn down just like deer trails sometimes and plumb full of big rabbits.

We could have that kind of limit on cottontails, but it wouldn’t do us much good. With the population of red-tailed hawks and owls that we have and the combination of a cold winter we wont always get our limit even at 3.

Snowshoe hare don’t have a limit or a season, but they’re a completly different animal. When you have to take 4 or 5 guys and spread them out over a mile circle it can get pretty nuts. Their habitat is usually big tracts of paper company land with thousands upon thousands of small birch trees about 1-3″ in diameter or jack pines the same size. When one hare is runnin the circle you gotta listen cause the minture you hear them turn and head your way the bunny will be there, especially in deep snow. You always gotta keep an eye open for “sneaker bunnys” too, that are just tryin to stay out of the dogs’ way. A first timer that has run on cottontails exclusively will be amazed at what he will see a hare do.

Just steer clear of procupines! we ran into $500 worth of porcupine one day…in vet fees that is.

We could have that kind of limit on cottontails, but it wouldn’t do us much good. With the population of red-tailed hawks and owls that we have and the combination of a cold winter we wont always get our limit even at 3.

Snowshoe hare don’t have a limit or a season, but they’re a completly different animal. When you have to take 4 or 5 guys and spread them out over a mile circle it can get pretty nuts. Their habitat is usually big tracts of paper company land with thousands upon thousands of small birch trees about 1-3″ in diameter or jack pines the same size. When one hare is runnin the circle you gotta listen cause the minture you hear them turn and head your way the bunny will be there, especially in deep snow. You always gotta keep an eye open for “sneaker bunnys” too, that are just tryin to stay out of the dogs’ way. A first timer that has run on cottontails exclusively will be amazed at what he will see a hare do.

Just steer clear of procupines! we ran into $500 worth of porcupine one day…in vet fees that is.

I use to run beagle in Pa…the limit here is 4 per day and getting four is not that hard. I now hunt birds only but on our trip to Iowa I was thinking how much fun it would have been to have a beagle or two along. There were so many bunnies that they were bumping off our legs as we walked through some of the fields…I can understand why Iowa has the ten per day limit…Doesn’t anyone out there hunt em????

I use to run beagle in Pa…the limit here is 4 per day and getting four is not that hard. I now hunt birds only but on our trip to Iowa I was thinking how much fun it would have been to have a beagle or two along. There were so many bunnies that they were bumping off our legs as we walked through some of the fields…I can understand why Iowa has the ten per day limit…Doesn’t anyone out there hunt em????

PiratePete, if you are ever looking for someone to help shoot some rabbits or need someone to haul ’em back for ya cuz u got a bum leg give me a holler…

PiratePete, if you are ever looking for someone to help shoot some rabbits or need someone to haul ’em back for ya cuz u got a bum leg give me a holler…

Yeah Piratepete, I’ll blast some of those brush busters with ya……Just give me an rookie a holler….

Yeah Piratepete, I’ll blast some of those brush busters with ya……Just give me an rookie a holler….

the rabbit population is very good this year. Everywhere i go i am kickin up bunnies. I hope i can hone in my shootin skills by shootin a bunch of runnin bunnies, for deer hunting great practice CAN’T WAIT!!!

the rabbit population is very good this year. Everywhere i go i am kickin up bunnies. I hope i can hone in my shootin skills by shootin a bunch of runnin bunnies, for deer hunting great practice CAN’T WAIT!!!

I saw more rabbits deer hunting this year than the last 5 years combined. I like hunting them, but not really eating them, so I don’t go out alot.

I saw more rabbits deer hunting this year than the last 5 years combined. I like hunting them, but not really eating them, so I don’t go out alot.