5 ms·

Goodness. How big are the rabbits in your area? The ones here are so large that I imagine that A) a cat could not catch them and B) the rabbit would disembowe

Goodness. How big are the rabbits in your area? The ones here are so large that I imagine that A) a cat could not catch them and B) the rabbit would disembowel the cat with its rear feet. I've seen rabbits do impressive things to small dogs and snakes. I wouldn't want one near my cats.

gpderetta 4y ago
I have seen cats catch rabbits as big as themselves.
- hollywood_court 4y ago
  That’s impressive. On my mothers farm, the turkeys run the show followed by the geese. But neither one of them will ever bother the rabbits. It’s interesting watching the hierarchy. She has numerous 150lb+ dogs and they all defer to the turkey and geese. Even the donkeys don’t go near the turkeys and geese The geese can’t really hurt you, but I’d rather fight a 150lb dog than a 60lb turkey.
mhuffman 4y ago
My grandfather used to keep a couple of rabbits in the barn to run off the rats! He swore that rabbits naturally hated rats and would fuck them up if they could get near them.
- hollywood_court 4y ago
  Rabbits can be fierce. They aren’t as intimidating as wild turkeys or the boars around here, but I wouldn’t want to try to handle a wild rabbit.
dboreham 4y ago
Smaller cats will catch the baby rabbits, but a larger cat has no trouble catching and eating adult rabbits in my experience. The largest thing I've seen a cat catch was a grouse. Turkeys are too large. Weasel like things seem to be too fierce.
- hollywood_court 4y ago
  They don’t want to catch a turkey. We’ve had turkeys kill medium sized dogs and they’ve put holes in the side of the feed man’s truck with their claws.
dageshi 4y ago
Living on a farm, I've seen some fairly impressive semi feral tom cats. When they're young and they hunt a lot they develop muscle on every inch of their body, once had one who was quite tame, his back muscles felt like a bag of marbles, they were that well developed. I'd have no doubt he could've taken a rabbit especially given the ambush nature of their hunting.
brigandish 4y ago
I watched a documentary many years ago on cats (in the UK). It featured a study looking to measure the number of animals killed by house cats (or just "cats" in British English, strays are incredibly rare, "house cats" are those that never leave the house). One house cat, in Devon if I remember correctly, had the most kills in the study - an order of magnitude above or something like that - and so the cameras paid his owner a visit. They introduced the cat with a shot of him on what looked like a hill with a ledge and him looking over it, and a town out of focus below in the distance. One moment he was there, next moment he just dropped over the ledge, no jump, just dropped. Cut to the owner talking about his cat. Next shot, the cat is back on the ledge holding a giant rabbit (or perhaps hare) in its jaws, that was comparable to the size of the cat, if not bigger. It was like watching a big cat kill. I'll never forget it, so striking.

gpderetta 4y ago

I have seen cats catch rabbits as big as themselves.

hollywood_court 4y ago
That’s impressive. On my mothers farm, the turkeys run the show followed by the geese. But neither one of them will ever bother the rabbits. It’s interesting watching the hierarchy. She has numerous 150lb+ dogs and they all defer to the turkey and geese. Even the donkeys don’t go near the turkeys and geese The geese can’t really hurt you, but I’d rather fight a 150lb dog than a 60lb turkey.

mhuffman 4y ago

My grandfather used to keep a couple of rabbits in the barn to run off the rats! He swore that rabbits naturally hated rats and would fuck them up if they could get near them.

hollywood_court 4y ago
Rabbits can be fierce. They aren’t as intimidating as wild turkeys or the boars around here, but I wouldn’t want to try to handle a wild rabbit.

dboreham 4y ago

Smaller cats will catch the baby rabbits, but a larger cat has no trouble catching and eating adult rabbits in my experience. The largest thing I've seen a cat catch was a grouse. Turkeys are too large. Weasel like things seem to be too fierce.

hollywood_court 4y ago
They don’t want to catch a turkey. We’ve had turkeys kill medium sized dogs and they’ve put holes in the side of the feed man’s truck with their claws.

dageshi 4y ago

Living on a farm, I've seen some fairly impressive semi feral tom cats. When they're young and they hunt a lot they develop muscle on every inch of their body, once had one who was quite tame, his back muscles felt like a bag of marbles, they were that well developed. I'd have no doubt he could've taken a rabbit especially given the ambush nature of their hunting.

brigandish 4y ago

I watched a documentary many years ago on cats (in the UK). It featured a study looking to measure the number of animals killed by house cats (or just "cats" in British English, strays are incredibly rare, "house cats" are those that never leave the house). One house cat, in Devon if I remember correctly, had the most kills in the study - an order of magnitude above or something like that - and so the cameras paid his owner a visit. They introduced the cat with a shot of him on what looked like a hill with a ledge and him looking over it, and a town out of focus below in the distance. One moment he was there, next moment he just dropped over the ledge, no jump, just dropped. Cut to the owner talking about his cat. Next shot, the cat is back on the ledge holding a giant rabbit (or perhaps hare) in its jaws, that was comparable to the size of the cat, if not bigger. It was like watching a big cat kill. I'll never forget it, so striking.