Sylvilagus nuttallii, Nuttall cottontail


Description

Color in fresh pelage: Top of head creamy buff with a slight shade of fawn color, lightly frosted on surface with gray; top of back a slightly paler shade of same creamy buff, darkened by an overlying wash of black; rump patch iron gray; top of tail dull buffy brownish; under side white; sides of head and body dull buffy gray, much paler and grayer than back; nape light rusty rufous, varying to a slightly darker and more cinnamon rufous, but like hind legs averaging much brighter rufous in pinetis and shading into a plaer, more rusty buffy on tops of fore feet; back and outside of lower hind legs similar to front of fore legs, but rufous deeper and richer; outside of hind feet more or less strongly shaded with rusty; tops of hind feet white, underlaid with a tinge of rusty buffy; underside of neck dull creamy buffy, varying ito a dull ochraceous buffy, with a wash or grayish on surface; rest of under parts pure white; sides of neck dull grayish creamy buff underlaid and tinged with a dul reddish brown, ears dull grayish, edged about terminal third with black. Worn pelage: Upper parts bleached to grayish white, underlaid by varying shades of the buffy brown underfur, which often give badly worn specimens a much darker or browner appearance, very different from freshly pelaged ones; legs average brighter rufous; outside of ears duller and browner; nape deeper and richer rusty; rump patch less distinct. Post juvenal pelage: Darker and more grizzled grayish buffy than adults, with rump patch much less distinct; sides of body only slightly grayer than back; legs bright rufous, as in adults. Juvenal pelage: Dark dull grayish buffy; rather darker than in teh young of pinetis; nape and legs duller and paler rusty, often becoming rusty buffy on legs and feet.


Image Source - http://www.fws.gov/klamathbasinrefuges/images/gallery/cottntl.jpg

Habits

Meek and timid in nature, the cottontail is nevertheless one of the most interesting animals of the woods. Rabbits in general vary little among themselves, but are, however, sharply separated from other species of the gnawing tribe. The soles of a rabbit's feet are not bare like those of most rodents; but are covered with hair - a fact which accounts for the lack of sharp definition in their footprints. Behind the two big front teeth of the rabbit's upper jaw are another pair of small teeth, which do not reach far enough down to be of any use. These inservient molars show that the ancestral rabbits of prehistoric days had four large front teeth instead of two.

A rabbit's front leg bones are so constituted that they cannot be turned inwawrd and used as hands when the animal is feeding. Thus a rabbit may reach high to nibble some tid bit, but its feet hang helpless during the process. In fact the rabbit does not use its front feet except when running and in manifesting anger by stamping.

Briar grown berry patches, sage covered ravines, isolated clumps of bushes, whether on the roadside or on the mountain slope - these are the haunts of the cottontail. Creek bottoms and places of impenetrable foliage suit his fancy to a nicety; winter and summer, he thrives on a woodland only a few rods square.

The food of the cottontail is more varied than that of most other animals, as it includes in summer, fruit, grasses, vegetables, and almost any herbaceous bit its fancy selects, and, in winter, dead grass, buds, the bark of poplar, willow, dwarf birch trees and occasionally tamarac. Sometimes it eats white cedar and spruce leaves.

Barnes, Claude T. Mammals of Utah, Pgs 97-101, Bulletin of the University of Utah Inland Printing Company, Kaysville, Utah