Science of Trapping / Describes the Fur Bearing Animals, Their Nature, Habits and Distribution, with Practical Methods for Their Capture

by Elmer Harry Kreps

CHAPTER XXI.
THE RABBIT.

While the rabbit is classed among the fur-bearing animals, the skin having a slight market value, very few of the trappers ever market the skins as the price is so little that trapping the animals for their fur would not be a lucrative business.

The flesh is much used as food by the northern hunters and trappers, and also as bait for traps, and it is well for the trapper to know something about the animal and how to capture it.

Properly speaking there are no rabbits in North America, the animals known by that name being classed by naturalists as hares, but the name is so universally used that it would be useless now to try to bring the true name into general use.

There are many species, one or more of which will be found in almost every locality of North America, but the most important species are the common cottontail, the jack rabbit and the snowshoe rabbit, or varying hare. Of these there are many varieties, but they are so similar in appearance and habits that I do not consider it necessary or advisable to go into detail in describing them in a work of this kind.

Rabbits belong to the class known as rodents or gnawing animals, and are distinctly different in structure from all other animals of the class. The long hind legs, long ears, small tail and soft fur is characteristic of the genus.

The common cottontail is found in almost all parts of the United States, in certain parts of the north only, being replaced by the snowshoe rabbit. They are smaller than the snowshoe and jack rabbits and are of a grayish brown on the back and sides shading to white on the under parts. The fur is a reddish brown in summer.

Their food consists of grasses, fruits and vegetables, bark, and the leaves of evergreen shrubs such as the laurel. They are especially fond of fruits, sweet apples being a favorite food, and are also partial to cabbage.

Their favorite haunts are the brushy, wooded bottom lands but they are also found on the hills and mountains; in fact, in almost any place where they can find food and shelter.