No rigor motis

[DaveW]

The other day I shot 3 rabbits (wrong forum I know). They were gutted and skinned within an hour or two and I noted at the time that no rigor mortis had set in one of them. They went into a cold fridge (3C) and the next morning the same rabbit has still not stiffened up. the other two are still stiff as you would expect.

As I understand it rigor mortis is caused by the muscles continuing to use sugars and oxygen which are not then replaced because there is no blood flowing. Therefore lactic acid builds up and the muscles cramp up / go stiff.

My questions are: what could possibly cause the above and is it safe to eat?

 

[Pine Marten]

Are you quite sure it's dead and not just resting?

 

[DaveW]

Ha! Well no head no heart and no lungs so I hope so...

 

[NickJ]

@Buchan

 

[DavyG]

Don’t eat anything that hasn’t stiffened…
Oops…wrong forum
DG

 

[Buchan]

DaveW - your understanding of the mechanism is correct. The causes vary from an infection to stress (so all the sugars are used up before death) but impossible to say. It's not worth eating.

 

[VSS]

Are you quite sure it's dead and not just resting?

'ees pinin' for the feeords!

 

[Husky]

Don't forget that rigor mortis goes away after time.

 

[DaveW]

DaveW - your understanding of the mechanism is correct. The causes vary from an infection to stress (so all the sugars are used up before death) but impossible to say. It's not worth eating.

Thank you for replying. Truly is a great resource to have you on here.

 

[Buchan]

Thank you for replying. Truly is a great resource to have you on here.

Aw, shucks. Thanks

Just a little side story on food safety. I follow ProMed, an international resource as a survey of diseases of known and unknown origin. And yes, it reported covid as oneumonia of unknown origin (which I, like many others, read, thought, Oh, interesting, and then thought no more) One report recently concerned gastrointestinal disease with one fatality in a village in Kenya. Turns out one person had a goat that wasn't right, killed it and distributed the meat. The illness was intestinal anthrax. I doubt that the carcass set, but in a hot climate you don't have that luxury of waiting