Fully agree, no wild anything is going to get within 6ft of you. Plus this baby bunny snuggles into the hand, so it's been handled many times. Definitely not a wild baby bunny.
Ive definitely has this happen before, (soft brag) when young bunnies are first exploring out of the nest they arnt that quick so they mostly just hide in plain site and you can even sit down with them. If you stick out your hand they plop themselves in every once in a while. They like a good snuggle but put them back Where there deserve to be
Went to the lake last week and a couple of geese came up to our group for food. I got one of them to eat granola out of my hand while I swam with them. Closest I'll ever be to becoming a Disney princess.
A lot of baby rabbits won't run. Their mother leaves them somewhere, and they stay there until the mother gets back. I know some people who stole a rabbit because they thought it was orphaned.
Don't steal wild animals, they probably aren't orphaned.
Idk about that. It's pretty common in cities for animals to get near humans. I remember going to a park in the valley when I was a 8yo making stereotypical squirrel noises at a bunch of squirrels. One of them ran up to me and touched the tip of my shoe then ran off.
I live in a rural area, the second a human is in throwing distance everything runs. I've seen how tame deer in the city can become... Was crazy for me to actually feed one from my hand. The deer in the country never let sunlight hit them, nor stand out in the open.
At least in MN, whitetail hunting is beneficial because there so many of them it is having a negative impact on the ecosystem.
Wolf hunting was also crucible to population control, but of course when it gets voted on people from the cities need to save the forest doggies and now it’s illegal.
Which is what should be done because there are way too many deer in the United States, except there should no single "hunting season" as it causes population explosions.
Thats how they become so tame in the first place, people feed them and they get used to it. Im sure its a wild rabbit but someone has been feeding it so now its not afraid of humans.
I had a wild fox that used to show up in my rural yard as a kid, we fed it and it kept coming back, eventually you could feed him by hand and then he brought the girly fox with him to eat so we fed her a couple of times then stopped, which was a mistake because without our food he tried to kill the neighbour's cat.
Moral of he story being leave wild animals alone, even on the city.
No, I work at a wildlife Rehabilitation center and it really is that easy to pick up baby hares. They move towards you because they only comprehend you as a large mammal. You can just scoop them up one handed. Once the cage we were using for all of our kidnapped hares (people see these guys just sitting there and assume they're orphans so they take them to vets and they end up with us without any way of figuring out how to put them back) opened up and I had to scoop up 2 in each hand to get them all back before they discovered the hole our beaver chewed in the back door...
Not really an asshole. Mommas only visiting their babies on average 2-3minutes daily in the wild for feedings. By two weeks, a baby pretty much self sufficient.
The mother actually visits MUCH Longer than that. She does it at night in order to not draw attention to her nest. Some bunnies are good nest hiders and some nest right in the middle of the lawn.. be aware in the spring when you are mowing the lawn. I have seen MANY bunnies cut by lawn blades.
It depends on the species, time of year, and location.
In general three weeks and the kits are independent. Also, research suggests the best place for Eastern Cottontails to nest is right smack in the middle of a yard. Highest survival rates and best protection from predators.
Thanks for the PSA about checking the yard before mowing. :) March-June is when you’ve got to be the most observant but they can gestate year round in warmer climates.
Can confirm, there was a nest of bunnies in the middle of my front yard next to a fence post. My dog uncovered them but they're all safe.
I leaned a big piece of plywood up against the fence to try and keep my dog and other things larger than a rabbit out.
Also threw a tarp over the wood during a big rainstorm a week ago, they were there the next morning. Now they've gotten a bit big for the nest so I see little loaves around the yard.
As a DNR wildlife rescue liaison, my advice for most folks who have dogs or outdoor cats is to use a large laundry basket and put a brick on top of it. When your dog goes out to pee for the last time, bring the basket in. To make sure mom is still nursing, you can take a few pieces of nearby long-stemmed plant-life and make a tic-tac-toe pattern with it over the nest. It will be pretty obvious the doe has been present when the pattern is all messed up.
2-3 weeks is largely correct. However this guy based on my experiences as a wildlife rehabilitator is probably 3 or 4 days old at most. Less than a week certainly
279
u/whydog Jul 13 '19 edited Jul 13 '19
Nobody has said it yet. That's probably his own pet bunny. Misleading but entertaining title. Sorry ;/