Posen farmer continues a lifelong ritual of raising rabbits

Raising rabbits on one Posen farm is a ritual dating all the way back to when Louis Lewandowski was five years old. This Easter weekend, as his children did when they were still living at home, Louis? grandchildren will enjoy cuddling up to some of the friendly critters on the rural farm on Hagensville Road. Not all of the rabbits are eager for the loving arms of small children. Louis said the mother of a large litter of one-month bunnies would rather get her teeth into anybody that restrains her.

Unlike their mother, the baby bunnies are calm. Lewandowski, 56, credits that to the constant sound of country music coming from a radio in the barn. Do they have a favorite station? ?I don?t even know what station it is on,? he said with a laugh. Lewandowski raises rabbits as pets, to sell, and for food. ?He just likes doing it,? said Janet Lewandowski, Louis? wife of 37 years. Louis likens his farm to ?Old MacDonald?s? in that he has cows, pigs, geese, ducks, guinea hens, and three farm dogs that greet everyone that enters their property. Raising animals is just a hobby because Lewandowski brings home the bacon, so to speak, from the Rogers City plastics plant. Janet works for Recollections, a Hawks business that designs Victorian clothing.

It is around East

er time when things get hopping around the farm as people come in to purchase rabbits, but according to the organization House Rabbit Society, contrary to the Easter time hype, rabbits and children are not always a good match. They say the exuberance of even the gentlest toddler is stressful for the rabbit. But not all rabbits are listening to Hank Williams Jr. and Carrie Underwood, like on Lewandowski?s farm. He said the rabbits eat pellets, corn and second cutting hay. It may not be P.C. (politically correct) around a holiday like Easter, but Louis loves eating rabbit meat about as much as he does raising them.

?If you fix it on the grill, it is better than chicken,? Louis said. ?Doctors say rabbit meat is good to have if you have heart trouble.? Louis is a good example of that, as he has no heart problems that he is aware of.