Audubon Cottontail
Cottontails are common in the coastal sage scrub association and in and around citrus groves, but generally penetrate the mountains no farther than the lower limit of the chaparral association. They are everywhere on coastal alluvial slopes, except in the barren washes, and prefer patches of prickly-pear and often are loathe to leave its protection. After completely destroying a large patch of prickly-pear in the course of examining a wood rat house in the center of the cactus, I found hiding, in the main nest chamber of the house, a cottontail that dashed from its hiding place only when poked forceably with the handle of a hoe.
Cottontails are seldom above the sage belt in the chaparral associations, although along firebreaks and roads they occasionally occur there. Habitually cottontails escape predators in partly open terrain offering retreats such as low, thick brush, rock piles, and cactus patches; but on open ground beneath dense chaparral, cottontails may be vulnerable to predation.
Examinations of feces and stomach contents of the coyote reveals that it preys more heavily on cottontails than on any other wild species. Remains of several cottontails eaten by raptors were found in the sage belt.
In April, 1951, many young cottontails were found dead on roads in the sage belt, and a newly born cottontail was in the stomach of a coyote trapped four miles north of Claremont, on February 7, 1952.
Specimens examined.—Total, 3, distributed as follows: Los Angeles County: mouth of San Antonio Canyon, 2000 ft., 1 (PC). San Bernardino County: 2 mi. NW Upland, 1600 ft., 2 (PC).
Sylvilagus audubonii arizonae (J. A. Allen)
Audubon Cottontail
This subspecies was recorded on the interior slope from 5200 feet elevation, as at the head of Grandview Canyon, down into the desert, and was common in the sagebrush flats of the upper pinyon-juniper association. Piles of feces under thick oak and mountain-mahogany chaparral indicated that the rabbits often sought shelter there. Adequate cover is a requirement for this rabbit on the desert slope of the San Gabriels; in the juniper and Joshua tree belts the species occurs in washes where there is fairly heavy brush, and only occasionally elsewhere. In the foothills, when frightened from cover in one small wash cottontails often run up over an adjacent low ridge and seek cover in the brush of the next wash. In the wash below Graham Canyon tracks and observations showed that cottontails were taking refuge in deserted burrows of kit foxes.
In the pinyon-juniper association cottontails and jack rabbits probably occur in roughly equal numbers, but in the Joshua tree belt cottontails seem far less numerous than jack rabbits. In the course of a two hour hike in lower Mescal Wash, at about 3500 feet, eleven jack rabbits and two cottontails were noted.