I digress. My original intention was to get right into an “I’m-not-making-this-up” story about “rabbit-turning,” thus linking it with Brown’s yarn about “chicken-turning.” Allow me to fast-forward to springtime of my freshman year. It was “County Meet Time” (translation: livestock competition in Brown County). I was hanging around the rabbit area with zero chance of getting a ribbon. Alas, I had no entry, but I could at least associate with those who did….
Remember, rabbits were no higher than third-tier as animal project choices among students in my class. Only a few kids—usually living in town and limited to backyards for livestock projects—chose rabbits, and even fewer raised chickens. I had plenty of room, but, for reasons cited earlier, I bought a pair of rabbits as animals of choice….
AGAIN, DIGRESSION, AND apologies are in order. It won’t happen again, probably. As mentioned, it was county meet time, and youngsters from all over the county brought their entries, groomed for judging. Most of the crowds, of course, gathered around the cattle, horses, sheep, and hogs. They even had a “paid judge,” a bright young man with two college degrees and only a whisker away from a doctorate.
Dick Eudaly, now a good friend at Travis Avenue Baptist Church in Fort Worth, had studied at three of the foremost “ag” universities in the world—Oklahoma State, Texas Tech, and Texas A&M. In total awe, we applauded him generously. He smiled at us, acting as if he were more than competent to judge any sort of animal competition. Stifling a yawn, he gave the impression that judging animals at our county meet would be a breeze. (Usually, such judges gave ribbons for cattle, hogs, sheep, and goats, and a lesser judge, almost always a volunteer, ranked the rabbits, because at many shows, there were no rabbits.)
The young man wasn’t visibly shaken—remember, he already had two degrees—when the event chairman revealed a definite problem—the guy who had agreed to judge rabbits didn’t show, and there were several to be judged. The young Cowboy/Red Raider/Aggie was asked (actually, it was more of a plea) if he would judge the rabbit competition as well. Swelling with confidence, he responded, “Of course I will.” (Keep in mind that he had never judged rabbits or even seen it done….)
“Are they fryers or breeding rabbits?” the young man asked, his response implying that he knew something about one or the other. The director answered, “Fryers,” and the response seemed to relieve the deputized judge greatly. He gave the impression that he could judge fryers with an eye closed. Breeding rabbits? Not so sure. (Decades later, he admitted that whichever competition awaited—fryers or breeders—THAT would have been his area of expertise.)
Dick later admitted that he simply didn’t have the heart to confess that all he knew about rabbits was that they had floppy ears, pink eyes, and twitchy noses--the same facts known by pre-schoolers whose parents read to them at bedtime.…(This admission came, however, many years later when rabbit ribbons were faded. We “formerly unsteady freshmen” are now unsteady in other ways. Many have grandchildren showing animals in competition, and—surprise, surprise—are studying in “co-ed” agriculture and home economics classes! From what I understand, not many students choose rabbits for show animals today, either….)
BACK TO THE contest. The judge went straight to the rabbit tent, where a bunch of wide-eyed freshmen had their entries lined up, steadying them with their hands around the rabbits’ rumps that rested on rickety pedestals. He walked up and down, carefully eyeing each entry, much the way he would look at calves. Calves, though, were led around the ring, so they could be viewed from every angle. Dare he ask the kids to lead their rabbits around the ring? He thought not.
Realizing that “fryers” meant that the rabbits were raised for frying pans, the judge figured most of the meat would be found in the rear areas. He couldn’t see those parts; that’s where the youngsters were holding them down. Then, he had an idea! “Reverse the rabbits!” he ordered. (Dick swore later he had never heard the Reagan Brown chicken-turner story. He said this was the only way he knew to examine the “meaty” parts.)
The kids stared at each other in disbelief! They had practiced showing their rabbits, but had never heard such a request. They would have been no more surprised if the judge had ordered them to drop their pants! (High school freshmen, in those days, did exactly what teachers asked. If he had told them to start their engines, they would have looked for engines to start.) Tediously and slowly, they turned their animals’ “rumps outward,” trying, as best they could, to steady their bunnies by holding on to their front legs. The rabbits fidgeted, not accustomed to being in such poses. (I laughed at the “what if” thought of having an entry. Mine would likely have wound up sideways! My buck and doe, as you’ll soon see, had nothing to show for their efforts.)
SENSING THEIR DISCOMFORT, the judge realized that with just a few word strokes, he had painted himself into the smallest of corners. What to do? He did what seemed most logical, given the rabbits’ new positions. He methodically felt the rump of each rabbit, humming softly as he made pencil notes. He determined which rabbits were “rumpiest” and awarded ribbons accordingly. No eyebrows were raised, not even one. The kids just figured this was a new rabbit-judging technique, introduced and perfected at one of those great universities—perhaps researched at all three--and was just now making its way to our part of the country.…
NOW, I RETURN to my sad agricultural efforts. Though “rabbit-turning,” like “chicken-turning,” is funny at the very thought, my efforts to raise rabbits in the high school 4-H club weren’t funny and weren’t successful. As my teacher suggested, I bought a full-grown buck and doe and built my own rabbit hutch, using apple boxes and some used chicken wire. I whistled while I worked, thinking in single dimension: keeping the rabbits INSIDE the hutch. I gave no thought to hutch predators from the OUTSIDE. I use the word “hutch” as often as I can, because every time I said “cage” around Mr. Wheeler, he corrected me. (Critical error number one: Use half-inch hail screen, not two-inch chicken wire, for the cage. No one was that specific about how to build the hutch.)
Sure enough, in a few weeks, I was more than excited to find eight wiggly bunnies when I went to feed one morning. I couldn’t wait to tell the teacher of my good fortune. Dollar signs filled my mind. After all, I only had four dollars invested in the pair of rabbits who were capable of producing many, many more litters. I was told I might get two dollars each for the bunnies on a Saturday morning from kids playing on the lawn at the county courthouse square.
These thoughts lasted only a few hours. I was counting rabbits too soon after they’d “hatched.” Imagine my horror after school that day when I opened the hutch to feed the rabbits, and the babies—every last one of them—were missing! I told my sad story to all who would listen. My teacher asked what kind of wire I had used. “Should have used one-half inch hail wire,” he sighed. “My guess is that a cat was able to get its paw through the chicken wire.” (How weird, I thought, but then reckoned, from a cat’s point of view, this was easier than chasing mice. Sort of like catching fish in a rain barrel.)
It made sense--we had a cat—we called her our “mouser.” We noticed that she seemed quite content just to lie around the next couple of days, like out-of-shape old men in front of the television after Christmas dinner.…I guess she was also our “rabbiter.…” (Critical error number two: When you don’t know how to build a rabbit hutch, ask--don’t just guess. As Dad said, “If it’s worth
