Cuniculture is the agricultural practice of breeding and raising domestic rabbits as livestock for their meat, fur, or wool. Cuniculture is also employed by rabbit fanciers and hobbyists in the development and betterment of rabbit breeds and the exhibition of those efforts. Scientists practice cuniculture in the use and management of rabbits as model organisms in research. Cuniculture has been practiced all over the world since at least the 5th century.
History
Early husbandry
An abundance of ancient rabbits may have played a part in the naming of Spain. Phoenician sailors visiting its coast around the 12th century BC mistook the European rabbit for the familiar rock hyrax (Procavia capensis) of their homeland. They named their discovery , meaning 'land [or island] of hyraxes'. A theory exists (though it is somewhat controversial) that a corruption of this name used by the Romans became Hispania, the Latin name for the Iberian Peninsula.
Domestication of the European rabbit rose slowly from a combination of game-keeping and animal husbandry. Among the numerous foodstuffs imported by sea to Rome during her domination of the Mediterranean were shipments of rabbits from Spain. Romans also imported ferrets for rabbit hunting, and the Romans then distributed rabbits and the habit of rabbit keeping to the rest of Italy, to France, and then across the Roman Empire, including the British Isles. Rabbits were kept in both walled areas as well as more extensively in game-preserves. In the British Isles, these preserves were known as warrens or , and rabbits were known as , to differentiate them from the similar hares. The term warren was also used as a name for the location where hares, partridges and pheasants were kept, under the watch of a game keeper called a warrener. In order to confine and protect the rabbits, a wall or thick hedge might be constructed around the warren, or a warren might be established on an island. A warrener was responsible for controlling poachers and other predators and would collect the rabbits with snares, nets, hounds (such as greyhounds), or by hunting with ferrets. With the rise of falconry, hawks and falcons were also used to collect rabbits and hares.
Domestication
While under the warren system, rabbits were managed and harvested, but not domesticated. The practice of rabbit domestication also came from Rome. Christian monasteries throughout Europe and the Middle East kept rabbits since at least the 5th century. While rabbits might be allowed to wander freely within the monastery walls, a more common method was the employment of rabbit courts or rabbit pits. A rabbit court was a walled area lined with brick and cement, while a pit was similar, although less well-lined and more sunken. Individual boxes or burrow-spaces could line the wall. Rabbits would be kept in a group in these pits or courts, and individuals collected when desired for eating or pelts. Rabbit keepers transferred rabbits to individual hutches or pens for easy cleaning, handling, or for selective breeding, as pits did not allow keepers to perform these tasks. Hutches or pens were originally made of wood, but are now more frequently made of metal in order to allow for better sanitation.
Early breeds
Rabbits were typically kept as part of the household livestock by peasants and villagers throughout Europe. Husbandry of the rabbits, including collecting weeds and grasses for fodder, typically fell to the children of the household or farmstead. These rabbits were largely 'common' or 'meat' rabbits and not of a particular breed, although regional strains and types did arise. Some of these strains remain as regional breeds, such as the Gotland of Sweden, while others, such as the Land Kaninchen, a spotted rabbit of Germany, have become extinct. Another rabbit type that standardized into a breed was the Brabancon, a meat rabbit of the region of Limbourg and what is now Belgium. Rabbits of this breed were bred for the Ostend port market, destined for London markets. The development of the refrigerated shipping vessels led to the eventual collapse of the European meat rabbit trade, as the over-populated feral rabbits in Australia could now be harvested and sold. The Brabancon is now considered extinct, although a descendant, the Dutch breed, remains a popular small rabbit for the pet trade.