A few weeks ago, I saw a rabbit in the yard from an upstairs window. I used to see rabbits and their tiny kits in the early mornings and evenings over the years, but a bobcat and a red fox started crossing through from the surrounding forests and so, for a while, the rabbits disappeared. I was happy to see a rabbit again.
The rabbit was small—two large handfuls—and young. Without a side-by-side comparison, I could not be sure if it was a descendent of the native New England cottontail, or the slightly larger eastern cottontail, an introduced and separate but now more populous species. They both have gray-brown fur flecked with black and a white tail. They have shiny black eyes, but the eyes of the eastern cottontail are larger and its eyesight is keener.
A juvenile New England cottontail. (Photo courtesy en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Silly_rabbit)
I hoped it was a New England cottontail when I thought I detected black fur on its forehead and a broad line of black guard hairs along the outer edge of its ears, its identifying features. But the russet-colored fur I saw on its neck is found on the eastern cottontail, not on the New England cottontail. Only a DNA analysis of their pellets can positively distinguish between the two.
In a phone conversation with someone at MassWildlife, I learned that the elusive New England cottontails aren’t usually found in the landscape around houses. They are even hard to find in their preferred habitat of young forests with a substantial understory of impenetrable brambles and dense thickets, whereas the eastern cottontail prefers open fields, meadows, and the edges of those areas.
The loss of New England cottontails’ habitat due to development, the aging and fragmentation of forests, and certain forest management practices has led to a serious decline in the less adaptable New England cottontail and the increase of the more resilient eastern cottontail. The New England cottontail is not endangered but is considered a species of concern and is the subject of state, federal, and private conservation partnerships for habitat restoration and a captive breeding program.
Then, the other day, I saw the rabbit again, assuming it was the same one-—which I like to think it was—steadily munching on greens growing between flagstones and in the lawn. It had been caught out in a brief downpour of cleansing rain during the air quality alert. Its wet fur was shiny and the colors distinct. After nibbling on greens for a while, the rabbit spent a good bit of time attending to its coat of wet fur, licking and patting it dry with its front paws.
I sat on a step where I had a good view of the rabbit through the glass door and remembered the many stories about rabbits I had read to my children, such as “The Tale of Peter Rabbit” and “The Tale of Benjamin Bunny” by Beatrix Potter. Observing this rabbit right in front of me, I could see that Potter’s illustrations were clearly based on close observations.
I imagined my 6-year-old granddaughter from New York City sitting here with me, chatting about Peter Rabbit, and conjured the conversation we would be having while looking at the wild rabbit up close in its natural habitat: how it may live in the thicket of my neglected yard; how it may have a lot of babies; how it might make a nest lined with fur and grasses on the ground; how the babies are totally helpless at birth; how rabbits are vegetarians who nip off their greens with a sharp bite, leaving no ragged edges.
I’d tell her about the time long ago when I entered a secluded section of my neighbor’s garden, looking for her mother’s pet rabbit. And there, around the edges, were small, wild brown rabbits and one big white rabbit, all sitting in a circle facing the center as though they were in a meeting, or socializing.
Unless the subject came up, I would probably leave out the fact that rabbits are an important food for owls, bobcats, foxes, weasels, raptors, coyotes, snakes, and other carnivores and omnivores.
Later that day, I was watching the news on TV, a movement outside in the forest caught my attention. An intelligent-looking canine face with a long pointed muzzle, a slight smile around the mouth, bright inquisitive eyes, large pointed ears, a body covered with gray fur, with a big bushy black-tipped tail was staring into the house. When I returned its gaze, it moved along, trotting on a fallen tree trunk, its jaws empty.
Margaret Kusner is a retired art teacher, an artist, and a walker who enjoys the natural world.
