BRER RABBIT

Sun (Auckland), Volume III, Issue 901, 19 February 1930, Page 14

BRER RABBIT

The rabbit tribe is very likeable and interesting. Unfortunately, however, its members do enormous damage to the farmer’s crops, and man has tried by all sorts of means to get finally rid of these little creatures. But the world would be the poorer if this happened, and happily it is not likely to, for the rabbits, with their relatives the hares, are so numerous and breed so quickly as to defy all efforts to exterminate them. In North America alone there are no less than 143 kinds of these animals. The tiniest of all, the pikas, weighing about five ounces, live high up in the moutain country, and in summer when not making hay for winter use sit on the rocks sunning themselves and calling to each other. In good weather they are occupied in cutting grass and carrying it to a spot where it is exposed to the sun. Here the grass dries, and. when winter comes, provides ample food for the pika in his vast playhouse beneath the snow. In Arizona the jack rabbits, in reality hares, live on the plains and deserts. They have very long legs and large, sensitive ears, while their swiftness is extraordinary. When put to it, they can travel at 30 miles an hour and only very good horses can keep up with them. If the jack rabbit is alarmed it will jump four feet into the air in order to see what is around, and when in full flight will cover the ground with leaps ten times its own length. The desert hare will eat most things in the vegetable line, and in very hot weather may be seen sitting in the narrow sadow of a cactus stem and moving clockwise with the sun so as to keep always in the shade. Most hares and rabbits have a great dislike for water, but two species inhabit swamps and marshes. The swamp rabbit will take to the water when pursued, but his relation ot the marsh goes in for the sport of it and may often be seen frolicking in deep water on moonlight nights. When danger threatens he will lie submerged among the lilies with only his eyes and the tip of his nose exposed Though equipped with vocal chords, rabbits seldom use them, and commumcate with one another by rubbing whiskers and by stamping. No one has yet learned their code of signals (which reminds us of the drum language used by native peoples of Africa), but e tame rabbit can be taught to “talk” in T ay P lacin & it on a tambourlariy audTble Stampmss are ParticuThe great family of the rabbits and hares has lived upon this earth for many thousands of years; their bones are found m ancient deposits assoclated with the implements and hearths of prehistoric man. It is, in fact Possible that these feeble folk, as’ thev are called in the Bible, existed lrmw before the first human being ° ng