218 LEPORID^E— ORYCTOLAGUS 



legs are the regular weapons of attack in fights between 

 rabbits, the combatants bounding over each other like fight- 

 ing cocks ; but they also employ their incisor teeth and the 

 strong claws of their fore feet ; and both tame and wild indi- 

 viduals, if frightened or suspicious, will sometimes bite in defence 

 of their young, or even occasionally * otherwise. As a rule, how- 

 ever, they seem to be unaware of their undoubted power in this 

 respect, perhaps on account of the overpowering fright from 

 which the poor things suffer when captured. The old bucks 

 bite each other a good deal when fighting, as their ears are 

 frequently torn, and the wounds look as if made by their teeth. 

 At the commencement of a battle they lay the ears back like 

 an angry horse, but afterwards as they bound and kick they 

 keep them erect or move them much about. 2 



As soon as the young are old enough to wander, the nesting 

 burrow is deserted (about the 21st day at Kilmanock), and 

 mother and offspring go their own ways, taking up their abode 

 elsewhere. If suitable burrows are available close at hand they 

 do not wander far, 3 and at Kilmanock a yellow individual has been 

 noticed for more than a year living near the place of its birth. 

 The old bucks are probably solitary except when breeding, 4 

 and are occasionally found occupying disused stops after the 

 young have left them, but in this case a scout-hole is often 

 added to the original stop. Mr Millais's 5 suggestion that 

 the nesting-burrow may be enlarged and other new ones 

 constructed around it, until it may itself become the nucleus of a 

 small warren, may be true occasionally, but does not appear to 

 represent the normal procedure. 



Rabbits seem to be constantly practising at digging, and 

 their wanton horseshoe-shaped scratchings, a few inches deep, 

 may be seen in all places which they frequent, and often serve to 

 distinguish damage done by them from the work of hares. 

 According to Colonel Butler, 6 these abortive scratchings are 



1 Simpson, op. cit., 23 ; Jones, Woodcraft, 96. I have known young bunnies in 

 the nest to bite sharply when handled and teased on the day before they left it finally. 



2 See Charles Darwin, The Expression of the Emotions in Man and Animals, 

 chap. iv. 



3 Excluding occasional, but often very marked, exceptions. 



4 There is a good account of the life of rabbits in George Abbey's The Balance of 

 Nature, 1909, 227. 



• r ' iii., 47. 6 Quoted by Millais, iii., 50. 



