The Life of Rabbits

Of the order Lagomorpha and the family Leporidae, rabbits are mammals once mistaken as rodents, thriving in a diversity of habitats, including meadows, woodlands, grasslands, deserts and even swamps. Of the 87 currently recognized species of lagomorphs, including hares and pikas, almost 30 are considered endangered due to habitat erosion and climate change. While more than half of the world’s rabbit population can be found in North America, rabbits can also be found in Southwestern Europe, Southeast Asia, parts of Africa and South America, and a number of islands in Japan, including Ōkunoshima known as “Rabbit Island.”

Hundred of Breeds

While wild rabbits possess a limited variety of physical characteristics, such as the European rabbit and American Cottontail, of the 305 breeds of domesticated rabbits, they come in a rainbow of colors, long or short furs, straight or floppy ears and a wide range of sizes, from the tiny Netherland Dwarf to the massive Flemish Giant, which can weigh up to 49 pounds. Wild rabbits are crepuscular in nature, meaning they are most active at dawn or dusk, and while European rabbits nest in underground warrens, Cottontails make their nests above ground.

High Speed Mammals

Able to reach speeds up to 45 miles per hour, a rabbits hind legs are plantigrade at rest, yet digitigrade on their toes when running. Sleeping little in the wild, due to their need for constant vigilance against predators, a rabbit’s side-facing eyes give them a nearly 360 degree field of vision, save for a small blind spot at the bridge of their nose. Long domesticated since the early Middle Ages, when they were prized by French monks as a meat substitute during Lent, rabbits have been raised in captivity for pets, food and fur.

Prodigious Breeders

While a male rabbit is called a buck, a female doe gestates her young from 27 to 45 days, dependent on the species and breed, birthing five to eight kits in a nest known as a colony. With an average lifespan of two years for wild rabbits and 10-14 years for well-housed, well-cared-for domestic rabbits, Cottontails and Hares are solitary in terms of socialization, while European rabbits—the fore fathers of all breeds of domestic rabbits—live in large groups consisting of complex social structures, making the life of rabbits, a gentle and much-loved member of the animal kingdom.