Baby Bunnies

[Martin Hash]

I have a reverence for the creatures of the earth based on an assumption that they are organic machines, each designed specifically for their niche in the world, possibly for my personal enjoyment. Animals & insects have the aura of a 1956 Packard about them: rare, delicate, at risk and to be treasured. They must also be treated with respect & defended against folks who would take them to the wrecker. With those beliefs, whoa be it to the person who nonchalantly threatens the wildlife that lives in my yard, bunnies especially. In fact, in the hierarchy of animals that I will inflict grievous harm upon, dogs that kill, or even chase my bunnies, are at the top of that list.

Every spring the yards in my neighborhood are filled with young bunnies. They're not very large, I always considered them juveniles, but if that was the case, I've never seen an adult, which makes me think these must be some kind of pygmy bunnies. Since most of the neighbors feel as I do about the zoo-like atmosphere of our community, hence they adore the bunnies & don't threaten them in any way, the bunnies reciprocate by not running away when we walk by. That's probably not healthy for them considering the entire world of threat otherwise aligned against them: hawks, coyotes, and dogs from outside the fence.

My house is an especially fertile bunny haven. There's several bunny-sized drainage pipes to retreat into, dozens of decorative shrubs to hide behind, and my dog, Annie, is too old to care if a bunny was sleeping on her nose, but, best-of-all, there's the maze. A large hedge-maze that's difficult for humans to navigate, let alone Annie, and hawks can't get out if they get in so they stay away. Our maze is the promised land of bunny sanctuary, so-much-so, that when adventurous children try to walk through it, they always return marveling at both their success & the number of bunnies that accompanied their passage.

Maze.jpg

The center of the maze is open. I plan to put a water slide in there if I ever have grandkids, so there's water & power, and I keep the grass fertilized & mowed. Mowing the maze is a challenge, the walls are only wide enough to walk one way, and turning those hairpin curves leaves the blade exposed, so I tend to mow only irregularly. The other day, after looking, I noticed the grass was jungle-length, so I put on the noise protection earmuffs, and donned my sunhat so I wouldn't get skin cancer, pull-started the mower & went through the maze, always hugging the right-hand side so I'd hit every switchback & dead-end.

Finally, I came to the center, where the grass was extra luscious & high since it gets the most water & sunlight, and began carefully & methodically cutting the high grass so as not to clog the mower. I was almost done when I saw a teeny tiny baby bunny tottering a couple feet from the mower. I immediately stopped the engine & got onto all-fours to look at the little guy. There must be a hutch nearby & my mowing scared him out. It must have been his first time ever out in sunlight because the grass had been so long, and there's no way he could have moved around outside, especially considered how wobbly he walked. He tried to jump but awkwardly fell on his side before scrambling back up. I know better than to get too close nor touch the infant because baby bunnies are excruciatingly susceptible to human germs so that even breathing over them was a death warrant.

After a couple minutes the baby bunny had gone through the couple inches of clearance under the hedge and was gone. I tried to find where he had come from, and instantly noticed a little bunny nose pushing up through the sand my grass is planted on. He popped out, the sand falling off of his shimmering fur, looked around, probably also his first time outside the underground den, and eventually followed his brother under the maze. I carefully picked a tuft of bunny hair aside to see a third little baby still in the shallow hole in the soil, but this one seemed not to be interested in exploring, nor much afraid of me either, so I returned the cover of hair to let the little guy gain the courage to leave the nest another day.

bunny1.jpg

You can bet I paid special attention to what was ahead as I finished mowing the exit path through the maze, and indeed, twice I had to stop and wait for teeny tiny bunny babies to get out of the way, usually at their own pace. Loud mowers apparently are not on the baby bunny threat list. As I finished mowing, I knew with the grass cut down, the bunnies could hop around at their heart's content safe from predators. Well, maybe not snakes?

That night I checked and all 3 baby bunnies were back in their den looking up at me when I lifted the tuft of fur. I carefully put it back down determined I would check back in the morning. It rained the next day, and though I traversed the maze just to get to the center & check on the baby bunnies, the water had covered the hutch opening with wet sand, so I left. The next day was dry, and the baby bunnies were in their burrow but they were now a two days older, and when I picked up the tuft of fur, one of them barreled out of the den through the maze, soon followed by a second. They could sure move around well now. I expected the third guy to run away too but he just looked up at me until I replaced his cover. The next time I looked, they were all gone. I walked around the maze and every so often I'd see one of the bunnies crouched ahead in the path before bounding off ahead or under the maze. It was a satisfying feeling: cute little bunnies living in my maze for the kiddies to find.