Run Rabbit, er, Hare, Run
Art: J.R. Nelson
I’ve been thinking a lot about rabbits. Okay, truth be told, I’ve been thinking about how quickly rabbits make rabbit poop. And how much of it they make. Rabbits, evidently, do a lot of things in excess. My household recently acquired two rabbits to join our two birds, two fish and one dog, which is a small group as pets go for my family … the summer’s cache of tadpoles, frogs, lizards and crickets all having found their way back into the local ecosytem, one way or another.
Asa, my 7-year-old son, and Etta, my 5-year-old daughter, found the rabbits on a visit to one of those old-fashioned hardware stores that offer a little bit of everything, and the kids orchestrated such a persuasive campaign for bringing the rabbits home, there was little my wife and I could do but add the rabbits, a rabbit hutch, rabbit food and all the other rabbit paraphernalia to our shopping cart. At least we made sure the rabbits were both females so as to avoid that other infamous rabbit proclivity. Anyway, the kids are great at feeding and caring for the rabbits, but somehow I end up with poop cleaning duty. Hence, my rabbit contemplation.
Our rabbits, Netherland dwarfs bred for domesticity, aren’t the kind you’d find in the wild. In fact, in the wild, most of the rabbits we see around Park City aren’t actually rabbits; they’re hares. The only true rabbit you’re likely to see in Park City is a mountain cottontail, also known as Nuttall’s cottontail. We also have white-tailed and black-tailed jackrabbits, which, even though “rabbit” is part of their common name, are technically hares. In the upper elevations, we have snowshoe hares, my local favorite.
Though they look similar, rabbits and hares are completely different species. Hares are generally larger and have longer hind legs, bigger feet and longer ears than rabbits. The biggest difference between the two species is the way they come into the world: rabbits are born hairless, helpless and blind, while hares are born fully-furred, able to see, and capable of caring for themselves within an hour of birth.
All of our local rabbits and hares are crepuscular (I love that word), meaning they are most active around dusk and dawn, so that’s the time you’re likely to see them. The best way to tell whether you’re looking at a rabbit or a hare is to focus on the ears. Mountain cottontails have small ears, while the ears of jackrabbits and snowshoe hares are very long. In fact, jackrabbits, originally called “jackass rabbits” by early settlers, got their name because of their extraordinarily long ears.
During most of the year, cottontails, jackrabbits and snowshoe hares are similarly colored a grayish brown to blend in with the surrounding landscape. In winter, though, the coats of snowshoe hares turn snowy white. This color change, or “molt,” which biologists believe is triggered by shortening day-length, takes about 72 days to complete.
Rabbits and hares are very good at using their protective coloring to evade predators. When alerted to danger, cottontails will usually hop a few yards and then freeze, attempting to blend in with the surroundings. Jackrabbits and snowshoe hares are better at using their speed to escape — jackrabbits can run up to 35 miles per hour and cover 20 feet in a single bound — but they also employ the “freeze” tactic to avoid detection.
Because of the hours they’re out and about, winter sightings of rabbits and hares are uncommon. However, if you venture out in winter almost anywhere around Park City, you’ll likely see their unique signatures in the snow. Snowshoe hares in particular leave distinct tracks. Pushing off from their large, densely furred hind feet, snowshoe hares hop two to four feet at a time and touch down lightly with their front feet, while their back feet continue forward to land a few inches in front of the first prints. Looking at the two large footprints side-by-side ahead of two smaller, narrower prints, it’s easy to think you’re looking at the track of an animal with huge front feet and tiny rear feet or that the animal was traveling in the opposite direction.
For me, skiing or snowshoeing across these telltale signs of our shared snowy landscape always makes a winter outing more satisfying.
Mark Menlove muses about nature in each issue of Park City Magazine.
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