She always glows pink so you can disguise the fact that she's always feeling blue

[sovay]

My mother planted some young trees in her side yard last weekend. The overgrowth of rabbits afflicting the neighborhood has since eaten all but two. She is very upset, especially since they have also eaten her strawberries and her tomatoes, seemingly impervious to the usual safeguards. I made a temporary shelter for the leafier, less gnawed of the two survivors tonight and may return over the weekend to construct a more permanent one. Needless to say, I also spent some time yelling and driving rabbits out of the yard. They were astonishingly unafraid for something so plump and delicious.

I do not understand, if one can rent goats to clear one's lawn of poison ivy and other weeds, why it is not possible to procure foxes for similar purposes. Wanted: one vixen with plenty of hungry kits to feed. Offering: attractive side and back yard with overgrown ravine suitable for denning, gratitude and admiration of nearby humans who will maintain respectful distance, all the rabbits you can eat. Please respond by moving in at your convenience.

(I am all in favor of breeding the endangered New England cottontail back to a stable population. The invasive Eastern cottontail is eating everything my mother plants and I think about Hasenpfeffer.)

Comments

[yhlee]

Now I am hungry for Hasenpfeffer, which I only know what that is because of Joe.

I hope you get your vixen and kits!

[sovay]

Now I am hungry for Hasenpfeffer, which I only know what that is because of Joe.

I have only had it a couple of times in my life, but it is delicious and I am sure it's not safe to make from garden rabbits any more than Canada geese should be cooked for Christmas, but I still think about both.

I hope you get your vixen and kits!

If you can pull any fox-strings . . .

[gwynnega]

That is very annoying! We don't have many rabbits around here, though we do sometimes have bold squirrels.

[sovay]

That is very annoying!

I don't remember them being so bad until a few years ago, but then there was some kind of population explosion—I suspect we eliminated or at least badly thinned the local predators—and now there are officially Too Many Rabbits. They are making gardens difficult.

We don't have many rabbits around here, though we do sometimes have bold squirrels.

Do they eat gardens?

[gwynnega]

The squirrels like to take bites out of the oranges from my mom's orange tree and leave the peel strewn around the garden.

[sovay]

The squirrels like to take bites out of the oranges from my mom's orange tree and leave the peel strewn around the garden.

Jeez.

[genarti]

I had no idea the rabbits one usually sees were invasives!

(I never get to use this icon but I am now glad I hung onto it.)

[sovay]

I had no idea the rabbits one usually sees were invasives!

I didn't know until recently, either. I feel it is all the more reason to eat them, as with green crabs.

(I never get to use this icon but I am now glad I hung onto it.)

It's a great icon!

[choco_frosh]

I feel morally obligated to make you watch Attack of the Green Crabs.

ETA I did not know they were a traditional Venetian delicacy! Perhaps Filippo or someone can be convinced to start cooking them...

[sovay]

I feel morally obligated to make you watch Attack of the Green Crabs.

I'd never seen that! That's depressingly informative and amazingly animated: "The Schwarzencrab!"

I did not know they were a traditional Venetian delicacy! Perhaps Filippo or someone can be convinced to start cooking them...

I didn't actually know about the Venetian thing until this article, either! I just knew they were invasive and delicious. I wish I had more money to throw at restaurants and suppliers. I will have to settle for awareness (and maybe attending their book signing).

[wpadmirer]

DAMN! Here I have problems with the squirrels eating things. I had a ginger they ate to the ground and then dug up the root and ate. (sigh)

[sovay]

I had a ginger they ate to the ground and then dug up the root and ate.

I'm so sorry! I didn't know squirrels were that ravenous, too.

[wpadmirer]

They were that year. The little bastards.

[lauradi7dw]

There are coyotes in Lexington, but presumably not enough to eat all the rabbits.
To prevent munching, there is extensive fencing at the Interfaith Garden (and usually netting over the berries to deter birds).
I am very surprised to hear that the buns ate the trees, though. That is usually ascribed to deer, of which Lexington used to have a few.
We have the one flowery/weedy yard on our street, which I cut to be sort of lawn height, out of neighborliness. The usually total monoculture lawn across the street from us now has little clover flower patches, and I have been wondering whether the rabbits took the seeds over on their fur, as we have seen them graze back and forth.

[sovay]

There are coyotes in Lexington, but presumably not enough to eat all the rabbits.

There can't be! There are rabbits everywhere.

I am very surprised to hear that the buns ate the trees, though. That is usually ascribed to deer, of which Lexington used to have a few.

It's definitely the rabbits, not deer. We caught them in the act a couple of years ago when they did their best to kill my late-flowering dogwood by girdling her. With the baby trees, they're chewing off the bark and the new little leaves and leaving sticks stuck in the lawn. It's incredibly uncool.

The usually total monoculture lawn across the street from us now has little clover flower patches, and I have been wondering whether the rabbits took the seeds over on their fur, as we have seen them graze back and forth.

Sounds plausible to me.

[cmcmck]

Foxes and rabbits hereabouts are really connected- it one is in trouble, so is the other. If one does well,so does the other.

Mr Reynolds is a huge favourite of mine. :o)

[sovay]

Foxes and rabbits hereabouts are really connected- it one is in trouble, so is the other. If one does well,so does the other.

Our foxes are not flourishing, though, and I blame the local humans for that.

(I have always liked foxes, no matter how much the Redwall books told me not to.)

[asakiyume]

When I had a vegetable garden in my yard here, the rabbits loved to come and nibble *anything*. I put up chickenwire fencing, knowing very well that they likely could squeeze under if they wanted--but mainly they didn't.

I approve of your rent-a-fox idea!

One thing I remember about the Cambridge-Somerville area where we lived was that the squirrel used to go around chomping the heads off tulips--very depressing! You couldn't enjoy tulips because they got eaten. Maybe it was just a fad among a generation or two of squirrels in the particular neighborhood I was in. I don't suppose you notice a dearth of tulips in the spring, where you are?

[redbird]

Either it was just a fad, or it hasn't spread to my part of Somerville (near/east of Davis Square): more daffodils than tulips, but I have seen fine tulips, and not flowerless stalks. I expect squirrels to eat crocus flowers, often before the buds open, but don't know whether my neighbors here have been planting crocuses.

[asakiyume]

Yeah, it was so freaky! And I never actually saw a squirrel doing it, so perhaps it was an unpleasant human (or some other creature). Or maybe there was a squirrel ailment that the squirrel doctors said could only be cured by eating tulips, and then the ailment passed.

Anyway, I'm glad the tulips of near Davis Square are blooming unmolested! (I was on the Cambridge-Somerville Line somewhat above Inman Square, but it was a couple of decades ago.)

[sovay]

I put up chickenwire fencing, knowing very well that they likely could squeeze under if they wanted--but mainly they didn't.

We fenced in my dogwood for a couple of years to save her; we may have to do the same with my mother's garden. It just didn't used to be necessary!

I approve of your rent-a-fox idea!

I wish I knew who to pitch it to! Drumlin Farm?

I don't suppose you notice a dearth of tulips in the spring, where you are?

Not in my mother's yard! Those come up fine. (I am learning a lot about squirrels in this thread.)

[pameladean]

I am sorry about the little trees.

Around here, squirrels regularly eat tulip buds and blossoms. You can tell it's rabbits instead if they eat right down to the ground instead of "just" nipping off the blossoms or buds and devouring them.

Squirrels also like to take a single bite out of a tomato. I had read that they only did this out of thirst and that providing water would prevent it. Providing water reduces the incidence, but some squirrels must have acquired a taste for tomato juice.

P.

[ethelmay]

I haven't noticed any such tulip predation in Seattle, so perhaps our squirrels haven't learned the habit. We certainly have plenty of them. Not as many rabbits these days, though there was a population explosion of abandoned pets a while back and measures were taken (the Great Rabbit Roundup of 2006 or so). We do have a fair number of hawks and coyotes about (though I've never seen a coyote myself).

[sovay]

We do have a fair number of hawks and coyotes about (though I've never seen a coyote myself).

I would also accept more hawks.

[choco_frosh]

...Yeah, I'm increasingly thinking about a BB gun.

[sovay]

...Yeah, I'm increasingly thinking about a BB gun.

Oh! Do you know the legality of that sort of thing in populated areas? See selkie's question, below.

[strange_complex]

I did not even know you could hire goats for lawn-munching purposes! That sounds very sensible, and probably more environmentally-friendly than strimmers or weed-killer.

Rabbits have obviously been doing better than they used to in the UK recently, too. There are some living in Leeds city centre, I saw one in my garden recently, and so has my Dad. He lives in Birmingham, but in a similar position to me in Leeds - i.e. roughly half-way between the city centre and the edge of town, and definitely not where you'd expect to see rabbits or where we ever have before this year.

[sovay]

I did not even know you could hire goats for lawn-munching purposes!

It's very popular around here! Both my brother's family and gaudior's mother and stepfather did it, I think via different companies, even. I love it.

He lives in Birmingham, but in a similar position to me in Leeds - i.e. roughly half-way between the city centre and the edge of town, and definitely not where you'd expect to see rabbits or where we ever have before this year.

My parents have a ravine and a reservoir behind their house, so there were always some, but there wasn't always a siege on. You see them by the dozens as you walk down the street. I really think the town of Lexington must have done something catastrophic to its fox population; absolutely nobody is taking the rabbits out.

[selkie]

You can bow cull rabbit and deer without a limit these days by us as long as the bow is manual draw. When we had a yard, I considered. I wonder if you can bow cull in the Boston exurbs.

[sovay]

I wonder if you can bow cull in the Boston exurbs.

I can certainly find out. It's not like I don't have this recurve bow.

[sporky_rat]

And rabbit is delightful...