Oct. 13, 1906.] 
FOREST AND STREAM. 
57i 
Remarkable Increase of Hares. 
BY EDWARD A. SAMUELS. 
One of the most notable changes in the ferce 
■natures of a given district that has ever come to 
my personal knowledge has occurred within 
the past two years in certain sections of Nova 
Scotia, in which, in consequence of the changes 
of conditions, which have been brought about as 
regards environment and a great decrease of 
rapacious animals and birds which have hereto¬ 
fore kept them in check, the ordinary numbers 
of the great northern hare have multiplied in a 
most astonishing manner. Of course, it would be 
exaggeration to state that these animals bid fair 
to rival in fecundity and numbers the rabbits 
which were years ago planted in Australia, the 
descendants of which have become one of the 
greatest pests that has ever been inflicted on 
any country; but it is easily within bounds to 
say that the northern hare of Nova Scotia 
shows almost as striking an example of what 
may be done by even a slight change in the bal¬ 
ance which nature has provided to check the 
too great increase of certain species of animals. 
Natural History of the American Hare. 
This well-known rodent, commonly called the 
northern or American hare, Lepus' americanus, 
but often, though improperly, named the white 
rabbit, is more or less abundantly distributed 
from Pennsylvania northward to about the 68th 
degree of latitude, where it is replaced by the 
great Arctic hare, Lepus glacialis , its western 
limit being the Missouri plains. The appellation 
“white rabbit” that is bestowed on it is a mis¬ 
nomer, for we have no true rabbits on this 
continent, all our species of Lepus —and there are 
some twenty of them—being strictly hares, in 
that they do not burrow after the manner of 
European rabbits, and their young are born 
with their eyes open, and are, moreover, covered 
with hair, while the true rabbits are born naked 
and with eyes closed, in which condition they 
remain for two or three weeks. Of course, there 
are many anatomical differences between the 
two groups by which systematists separate them, 
but for our present purposes the above simple 
description of their characteristics will suffice. 
The American hare is very prolific, the female 
giving birth to four or five young twice^ and 
sometimes three or four times in a year, the 
leverets being brought forth in a soft, slightly 
raised nest she constructs and lines with fur 
pulled from her body. Ini ten days or a fort¬ 
night the little creatures, which are veritable 
hares in miniature, are able to leave the nest 
or form, as it is called, and run about; but they 
remain with the mother until they are at least 
half grown. Prolific as this animal is, and 
provided as it is with an abundance of food 
which is accessible on every side, it would, if 
it were not surrounded by a great number and 
variety of natural enemies, increase to such a 
degree that it would become a nuisance to the 
agricultural interests in localities which it finds 
adapted to its residence and growth. 
Change of Natural Conditions. 
The ordinary abiding place of this hare is in 
a forest-covered country, in which its enemies 
also find suitable coverts for approach upon 
their prey. In such surroundings, if the normal 
equilibrium is maintained, possibility of too 
great an increase is avoided; but remove the 
hare from great stretches of forest growth and 
locate it in a region in which there is scarcely 
more than a covering of shrubs and bushes and 
also destroy its natural enemies, and you pro¬ 
vide favorable conditions for speedily increas¬ 
ing its numbers to almost any extent, and this 
is precisely what has been done in many por¬ 
tions of Nova Scotia. 
For a number of years extensive forest fires 
have swept over vast stretches of country, from 
which the timber and other trees, after having 
been killed by the flames, have been removed, 
mostly for fuel, for fire-wood is a valuable com¬ 
modity in southern Nova Scotia, and as a result 
immense stretches of treeless barrens are left 
upon which nothing but bushes and low shrub- 
AMERICAN HARES. 
bery have sprung up. Now these great wastes, 
sometimes miles upon miles in extent, furnish 
an environment that is exactly adapted to the 
well-being and increase of the hare, and the 
animal has taken advantage of its opportunities 
and in many sections is almost as numerous as 
are the locusts in the harvest field. 
Numbers Shot and Snared. 
Some idea of its prodigious numbers may be 
had when I state that on a “snaring trip” of 
one or two days, or an outing with the gun in 
the same length of time, from thirty to fifty 
are a common kill. 
According to a local paper of recent date: 
“A party of seven of our Liverpool sportsmen 
started for Big Falls on Monday morning and 
returned Tuesday night with 333 rabbits, which 
they shot during their absence.” 
The record bag, however, was made by three 
hunters, who in a single afternoon shot eighty- 
six of the handsome rodents. Although im¬ 
mense numbers have been killed, not one has 
been wasted, for those which were not brought 
into immediate use on the table were lightly 
salted, or preserved in spices for future needs. 
The destruction has been very great, but it 
has apparently caused but slight diminution in 
their ranks;, and as the close season is now on, 
it having begun March 1, a still larger supply 
may be confidently looked for in the coming 
autumn. 
Enemies of the Hare. 
As before stated, the hare has numerous 
natural enemies, but they are all forest-in- 
habitors; among them the wildcat, or lucevier, 
loupcervier, Lynx canadensis, is one of the most 
destructive, but it would probably rarely venture 
out into the barrens in pursuit of the hares, 
even if it had not been hunted so closely as to 
have now become comparatively scarce, for the 
high prices which fur trappers have realized for 
pelts in the last year or two have made them 
more than usually energetic in pursuing this 
and other animals, a good lynx skin being easily 
worth about $2, to which must be added the 
bounty that is paid for the destruction of this 
animal, which is in some counties $2 and in 
others but $1. 
The common red fox is another relentless de¬ 
stroyer; but the trappers have reduced its num¬ 
bers so materially that there are not enough 
left to do much toward keeping it in check. 
The mink, were it more abundant, would per¬ 
haps work great havoc among the helpless 
rodents; but in the first place it is most in¬ 
dustriously pursued by trappers, good skins com¬ 
manding very high prices, two comparatively 
small ones having, to my knowledge, been re¬ 
cently sold to a local dealer for $11.50; so that 
the time is apparently not far distant when it 
will in trapping districts become quite scarce. 
But if it were not so abundant, it would not, 
in all probability, take up a home upon the 
barrens in pursuit of the hares, for it is almost 
as amphibious as is the otter, and is really more 
of a fish-eating than a carnivorous creature. Of 
course it kills relentlessly every animal or bird 
it can overpower, sometimes, I have thought, 
merely for the sake of killing. But it always 
prefers the neighborhood of water for an abid¬ 
ing place, and unless it were traveling across 
country, would not give much attention to the 
denizens among the dry uplands. 
The skunk is another destructive beast; but 
its pelt has also come tO' be valuable, and its 
numbers are therefore too small to work much 
havoc among the hares. 
The great horned owl is, in a forest-covered 
country, the greatest enemy of all the rapacia 
to the Leporidce ; but is does not pursue them 
upon the barrens, for, like the wildcat, it prefers 
to do its hunting among the trees. 
Concerning Weasels. 
There remains but one of the carnivorous 
animals which will probably work much destruc¬ 
tion among these rodents, and this is the com¬ 
mon weasel, or ermine. This active little animal 
is as bloodthirsty as may well be imagined; 
it will live and thrive afar from the forest, or 
from waterways. It is quite prolific, and until 
very recently has not been valued highly by 
fur trappers, so that it is much more abundant 
than is generally supposed to be the case. In 
late years its beautiful white winter pelage has 
found a value, and trapping it may in the not 
distant future reduce its numbers very con¬ 
siderably. 
This ermine is the largest of the weasels 
