Revisiting Old Friends

The rabbits of Chicago never left during the winter. But now that it's sunny out they're popping up in some pretty extreme places. I spotted this one on my daily walk home from work, hanging next to interstate 94. A work crew came a couple weeks later and mowed the lawn. Haven't seen the rabbits since but I bet they'll be back.

Rabbit Redux

It was a balmy 34 degrees this Sunday so I decided to head to Millennium Park to see how Chicago's downtown rabbits are dealing with the winter. They've gained some weight and the first few I met appeared a little skittish. Eventually I gained their trust and even sneaked into a rabbit burrow to capture these awesome shots.

While lying in the snow snapping pictures of this guy I reflected on two things. 1) I ate a roast rabbit once at a Portuguese restaurant that was really phenomenally delicious. I wonder why I've never eaten rabbit again considering how tasty it was. And 2) I've never read any John Updike novels. In fact, for a writer who is supposed to have had a wide ranging impact, I know few people (personally) who celebrate his work, bring him up in literary conversations etc etc. Is he the kind of writer that critics love but that is not on the radar of your average literary citizen? Is he just not of my generation? Probably I'm just not hanging out with the right crowd. The Updike crowd. I imagine the Updike crowd drinks highballs on the on the Upper East side. I'll look into it. Anyway, at least I read Watership Down. Actually, maybe thats why I never ordered rabbit again.

Jackrabbit Slim

The Big Bend Website calls the hare "nature's ideal prey." It must suck to be them. On the upside they are constantly reproducing. Their numbers do not dwinddle. I believe the Jack rabbit uses his ears both to hear distant prey and to cool down in the brutal desert sun. The Jackrabbit is really a "hare."

A Rare Hermit-Crab Rabbit

I have mentioned in a previous post how the Austin Science and Nature center features quite a few "non-exotic" species of animals. While many of the Center's residents can be commonly seen outside of a zoo context, the center chooses to present these creatures with great fanfare and in heavily fortified environments.

When I came across this over-weight rabbit I assumed it was another example of the center's tendency to celebrate the less unusual species of the animal world. Why, I wondered, was this harmless bunny in a cage that could house a pride of Lions? Why did the zoo-keepers surround Mr. Nibbles with more security than Alcatraz? And why the prop tree-trunk that, frankly, doesn't seem completely rabbit-appropriate anyway?

Then I realized that this was no common rabbit. This is a photo of a rare Hermit-Crab Rabbit. This rabbit hollows out tree trunks with its razor sharp incisors and then snugly fits its body into them, walking, literally, with its "house on its back." Like a hermit crab, its lower body is also a slimy worm-like tail that rarely sees the light of day. Pretty Cool!

The Urban Naturalist

There are two very interesting things about this rabbit 1) It was chewing its own foot, and 2) it lives in the middle of DOWNTOWN CHICAGO.

I was in millennium park, you see. I had the vague hope of maybe getting some insect photos, all of a sudden I realized the place was FULL OF RABBITS. Quite a nice discovery for an urban naturalist.

New England Rabbit

Contrary to what some people say, rabbits are not rodents. This is probably only one of the reasons they are delicious. I snapped this little fellow in the summer of '06 with my mom's digital camera. He thought that if he stood very still I wouldn't get him, but I did.