Three days ago our dog was in the back yard with Jackie and was oddly interested in a patch of soil under a sage plant in a raised garden box. Jackie investigated and found an unusual patch of downy fluff and fuzz. Confused, she pulled it aside and was very surprised at what she saw.
Now, it’s not unusual for us to see rabbits around. And in fact this spring has proven to be a bumper crop of them in the neighbourhood — much to Radar’s chagrin, as he’s very prey driven and goes out of his little doggie mind when one springs around anywhere within sight — and we’d seen an unusual number of them in our backyard. But in the nearly two decades we’ve been living here, we’ve never had baby bunnies nested in our yard.
We went into brainstorming mode. What could we do to keep the dog out of the nest but also allow the mother rabbit to still access them? Is the mom even still around? Are they in any way capable of handling themselves?
With eyes still closed and more wiggly than able to use their legs much, some research suggested they were no more than about a week old. So yeah, not getting around anywhere on their own for a while yet. Although that would happen sooner than I had expected. Wild rabbit babies are normally up and about and on their own at around three weeks old. Which is pretty crazy. Meanwhile, though, these ones clearly needed some intervention to keep the dog (and hopefully other predators) away.
We ultimately managed to get a short, segmented fence loaned by a local friend who’s a dog trainer. Turns out she’s had a number of baby rabbits nesting in her yard, as well, and she finds this approach works well.
Cut to shortly after, and Jackie and the teen had fashioned protective fencing the whole raised garden box, reinforced with stone supports inside and out, and with a gap off the side large enough for mom to get in and out but too small for Radar. I still had some concerns about other predators getting to them — we have plenty of raccoons and skunks and even the occasional opossum in the area, any of which would probably just love to get their hands on some wobbly rabbit nuggets. But there was only so much we could do. They were protected from the dog, and that was about the best we were going to be able to manage.
The next morning, Jackie kept him inside instead of letting him out back to pee. I was up a short while after her and normally take him for his morning walk anyway, so he wouldn’t be needing to hold his bladder too much longer.
Once the teen finally arose and really wanted to take a look at the babies, I reluctantly agreed. I was of course dying to see them as well, but just wanted them left alone as much as possible.
With a gentle peek under the sage and under the tufts of fluff it was determined… the babies were gone.
While I was concerned about predators, I quickly concluded they must have been moved by the mom. Predators would’ve ripped aside the camouflage and eaten the babies on the spot. It would’ve been a bloody mess left behind. But there was no sign of anything like that. They had been carefully moved — surely not able to get around on their own in their youth — and then, seemingly, the nesting put back in place.
Confusing matters more was the teen’s initial check online that suggested that rabbits didn’t (evidently couldn’t) move their babies. So how the hell did they get cleanly and presumably safely moved? And to where?
I threw the question out to Mastodon, which has proven over the years to be a wealth of hodgepodge interests and backgrounds and skills. It took a couple of rounds of asking — even without any algorithm mucking around with what users see (i.e. the posts of everyone you follow are shown in your feed chronologically), but you can still miss posts if you simply happen to not see them — but it was confirmed that rabbits do actually have the ability to move their young when and as needed. That can be for a variety of reasons, including feeling like there’s imminent danger in the area. So it wouldn’t be too surprising that, between the different smells on the nest (of us lookyloos) and the fence suddenly going up almost all the way around the nest and nearly blocking her out, the mom probably decided it was best to get the hell out of dodge.
We aren’t sure where the new nest is. It doesn’t seem to be on our property. But we’re in an urban area with plenty of back yards that offer at least some protection against at least some predators. So it wouldn’t be too hard for her to find proverbial (and perhaps literal) greener pastures.
There’s a good chance we’ll never know where the nest is. But we hope the babies are alive and well and hope to see them hopping around the immediate vicinity within the next couple of weeks.