95 Fun Facts About Rabbits

What is a baby rabbit commonly called?

A baby rabbit is a kit, or kitten; kits arrive naked, blind and helpless, yet they grow so fast that most are weaned within about a month.

Often mistaken for rodents, rabbits belong to which order of mammals?

Lagomorpha is the order of rabbits, hares and pikas; all three were filed under the rodents until 1912, when zoologists gave them an order of their own.

Roughly how long is a rabbit's pregnancy?

1 month: gestation lasts about 30 days, and a female can conceive again straight after giving birth, so a new litter can follow almost at once.

What do owners call the twisting leap into the air that a happy pet rabbit makes?

A binky is the name: the rabbit jumps and twists its head and body in opposite directions, so abruptly that a new owner can mistake pure joy for a convulsion.

Which breed, nicknamed the 'gentle giant', is the largest domestic rabbit?

The Flemish Giant can weigh 9 kg; it was bred around Ghent for meat and fur, perhaps as early as the 16th century, but is now better known as a docile pet.

What forms the primary component of a rabbit's diet?

Hay and grass should make up most of a rabbit's diet; without that fibre the gut can slow to a halt, a potentially lethal condition called gastrointestinal stasis.

How do rabbits primarily regulate their body temperature, especially in warm conditions?

Through their ears: rabbits barely sweat, so when they overheat the large blood vessels in the ears widen and passing air cools the blood before it flows back to the body.

What are the soft, nutrient-rich pellets that rabbits re-ingest called?

Cecotropes form in the caecum, where bacteria ferment tough plant fibre; eating them gives the rabbit a second pass at its food, and they hold up to five times the vitamins of ordinary droppings.

A rabbit's field of vision covers roughly what angle?

Nearly 360 degrees: the eyes sit high on the sides of the head, so a rabbit sees behind and far above itself, handy for spotting a hawk; the price is a small blind spot in front of its nose.

What is a male rabbit called?

Buck is the breeder's word for a male rabbit; bucks take no part in raising the young, and even the mother visits the nest to nurse only about once a day.

North America's pygmy rabbit, the world's smallest, depends on which Great Basin shrub for food and shelter?

Sagebrush makes up nearly all of the pygmy rabbit's winter diet and hides the burrows it digs for itself, a rare habit among North American rabbits.

How do rabbits communicate danger or annoyance to others?

Thumping a hind foot is the alarm signal: the rabbit slams a hind leg against the ground, a thud that carries through the warren and sends the others bolting for cover.

Rabbits are 'induced ovulators', which means what for their reproductive cycle?

Mating itself triggers ovulation in an induced ovulator, so there is no fixed cycle to wait for; ferrets and camels work the same way, and it helps explain the rabbit's famous fertility.

What is the proper name for a rabbit's short, upturned tail?

Scut is the word for the short, erect tail of a rabbit, hare or deer; Shakespeare's Falstaff uses it in The Merry Wives of Windsor, greeting 'my doe with the black scut'.

Unlike a rat's, a rabbit's cheek teeth share which trait with its front incisors?

They never stop growing: all of a rabbit's teeth grow for life, not just the incisors as in most rodents, so it must chew fibrous food constantly to wear them down.

Until the 18th century 'rabbit' meant a young animal only; what was the word for an adult?

Coney was the adult's name, with 'rabbit' meaning only the young; 'rabbit' took over after coney, which then rhymed with 'honey', turned into a rude pun and had to be given a new pronunciation.

Which part of its feet does a sprinting rabbit run on?

Toes: a rabbit's long feet are built to rest flat on the ground, but when it moves the weight shifts to the tips of the digits, a gait that zoologists call digitigrade.

What is a group of rabbits often called?

Colony is the usual term; 'warren' properly means the burrow system, which in European rabbits can house up to 20 animals, though at times the real social unit is a single breeding pair.

Which breed's velvety coat comes from a gene that shortens its guard hairs?

The Rex began in 1919, when a few oddly plush rabbits turned up in a litter in a French village and were bred on; fanciers now call the velvet-coated breed the 'King of Rabbits'.

A well-kept pet rabbit typically lives for roughly how long?

About 10 years: safe from predators, weather and disease, a well-kept rabbit typically lives 8 to 12, and a Tasmanian rabbit called Flopsy holds the record at 18 years and 10 months.

Why did Thomas Austin release wild rabbits in Australia in 1859?

To hunt for sport, as he had in England; from Barwon Park in Victoria the rabbits overran most of the continent within 50 years, the fastest spread of any introduced mammal on record.

Which pathogen was released in Australia in 1950 to cut a rabbit population of some 600 million?

Myxoma virus cut Australia's rabbits from about 600 million to 100 million within two years, but the survivors bred resistance and numbers climbed again, so a second virus followed in the 1990s.

Western Australia's No. 1 rabbit-proof barrier, finished in 1907, held which record?

The No. 1 Fence, 1,833 km long, was the longest unbroken fence on Earth when finished in 1907, yet rabbits had crossed the line as early as 1902, so two more fences went up behind it.

The volcano rabbit, one of the world's smallest rabbits, lives on volcanic slopes in which country?

Mexico is its only home: the volcano rabbit, or teporingo, lives on a few volcanoes near Mexico City, and unlike other rabbits it warns of danger with high-pitched calls, as pikas do.

The dark-furred Amami rabbit, a 'living fossil', is found only on two small islands of which country?

Japan's Amami rabbit found a new enemy in 1979, when mongooses were released on Amami Oshima to kill venomous habu snakes and preyed on the rabbits instead.

The Angora rabbit, bred for its long wool, is said to have originated in which present-day country?

Turkey's capital Ankara was long known as Angora, and the name stuck to three long-haired animals linked with it: the rabbit, a goat whose fleece is mohair, and a cat.

Which novel about rabbits fleeing their doomed warren was rejected seven times before publisher Rex Collings took it on?

Watership Down began as stories Richard Adams told his daughters on car journeys; his debut went on to win the 1972 Carnegie Medal.

Okunoshima, 'Rabbit Island', once housed a secret factory making what?

The army's poison gas plant, built on Okunoshima between 1927 and 1929, produced mustard gas and other agents; the island was even removed from some maps to keep it secret.

In the Vietnamese zodiac, which animal takes the place occupied by the Rabbit in the Chinese zodiac?

The Cat takes the Rabbit's fourth place in Vietnam's zodiac; a common explanation is that the old calendar sign for that year, mao, sounds like mèo, the Vietnamese word for cat.

After losing the rights to his cartoon star Oswald the Lucky Rabbit in 1928, Walt Disney created which character?

Mickey Mouse was the replacement after Disney's distributor claimed Oswald; Disney first called the mouse Mortimer, until his wife Lillian talked him into a new name.

Whose vegetable garden does Beatrix Potter's Peter Rabbit raid?

Mr. McGregor's garden is where Peter's father 'had an accident' and ended up in a pie; Peter gets out alive but leaves his new blue jacket behind, and it ends up on a scarecrow.

Who hunts Bugs with a shotgun in A Wild Hare (1940), regarded as the first true Bugs Bunny cartoon?

Elmer Fudd is the hunter; when Bugs pops up and coolly asks him 'What's up, Doc?', it is the first time the rabbit uses the line.

What are the tiny second pair of upper incisors that set rabbits apart from rodents called?

Peg teeth sit directly behind the big upper incisors and are a quick way to tell the two groups apart; even so, rabbits and hares were classed as rodents until 1912.

Medieval French monks reportedly bred rabbits as a 'meat substitute' during which observance?

Lent, with its ban on meat, is the season in the story, long repeated as fact; in 2018 Oxford researchers called the AD 600 tale a myth and concluded that rabbits were domesticated gradually.

The European rabbit, ancestor of every domestic breed, is native to which region?

The Iberian Peninsula and nearby southern France are its homeland; the animal was so little known elsewhere that the Roman writer Pliny described it as a kind of hare peculiar to Spain.

Which sound does a contented rabbit make by gently grinding its teeth?

Tooth-purring is the sound: a relaxed rabbit being stroked gently grinds its teeth, producing a soft vibration owners compare to a cat's purr; loud grinding, by contrast, signals pain.

Pliny recorded that Romans prized which rabbit delicacy, known as laurices?

Unborn and newborn rabbits, eaten whole, were Pliny's laurices; he added that rabbits bred so fast on the Balearic Islands that the people begged Augustus for soldiers to fight them.

Which band's 1967 hit 'White Rabbit' borrowed its imagery from Alice's Adventures in Wonderland?

Jefferson Airplane got the song from Grace Slick, who had written it for her earlier band, the Great Society, and brought it with her when she joined.

Which of these is a rabbit physically unable to do?

Rabbits cannot vomit, so anything swallowed has to travel the whole length of the gut; that is why swallowed fur and low-fibre blockages are so dangerous for them.

What is the translucent third eyelid that lets a rabbit rest with its eyes open?

The nictitating membrane keeps the eye moist while it stays open, so a dozing rabbit can still catch a sudden movement and bolt, a useful trick for an animal that so many others hunt.

Rabbits can breathe only through the nose because which structure sits over the soft palate?

The epiglottis stays engaged over the soft palate except during swallowing, sealing the mouth off from the airway, so any blockage in the nose leaves a rabbit fighting for breath.

Stuffat tal-fenek, a rabbit stew, is widely regarded as the national dish of which country?

Malta's ruling Knights of St John long restricted rabbit hunting; once the limits were lifted in the late 18th century, the stew became a popular favourite and, in time, the national dish.

Bugs Bunny's carrot-chewing habit was modelled on a Clark Gable scene in which 1934 film?

It Happened One Night has Clark Gable's Peter Warne chewing a carrot while he talks, and Bugs's animators said they copied it; the film also has a fast-talker who calls Gable 'Doc'.

Saying 'rabbit rabbit rabbit' for luck is traditionally done when?

On waking on the first day of a month, before any other word: a 1909 letter to Notes and Queries tells of children who said 'Rabbits' aloud as their first word each month for luck.

On the Isle of Portland, where the word 'rabbit' is taboo, what is the animal called instead?

'Underground mutton' is one stand-in: quarrymen are said to have blamed burrowing rabbits for rockfalls, and in 2005 posters there for a Wallace and Gromit rabbit film read only 'Something bunny is going on'.

'The rabbit died' was once a common euphemism for what?

A positive pregnancy test: in the 1930s Friedman test a woman's urine was injected into a rabbit and its ovaries examined, but the rabbit was killed and dissected whatever the result.

The Aztec Centzon Totochtin, 400 rabbit gods born to the goddess of the agave plant, presided over what?

Drunkenness was their realm: the '400 Rabbits' were gods of pulque, the fermented agave sap, and their name was itself a way of referring to the drink.

The constellation Lepus, the hare, sits immediately south of which constellation?

Lepus lies directly beneath Orion's feet and is often pictured as a hare being chased by the hunter and his dogs, Canis Major and Canis Minor.

In the 1950 film Harvey, the invisible rabbit is described as what kind of Celtic creature?

Harvey is a púca (pooka), a shape-shifting spirit of Celtic folklore; Elwood P. Dowd, played by James Stewart, introduces his unseen, over-six-foot friend to everyone in town.

Who Framed Roger Rabbit was 1988's second-highest-grossing film, behind which movie?

Rain Man finished ahead of it; Roger Rabbit's draw was its cast, with rival studios lending their stars so that Warner's Bugs Bunny and Daffy Duck appear alongside Disney's own characters.

Who provided the uncredited speaking voice of Jessica Rabbit in Who Framed Roger Rabbit?

Kathleen Turner spoke Jessica's lines without credit while Amy Irving sang them; director Robert Zemeckis had worked with Turner on Romancing the Stone.

Among German Lutherans, the original Easter Hare played what role for children?

Judge of their behaviour: like Santa with his list, the hare decided which children had earned eggs; a German text of 1682 already describes an Easter Hare laying eggs in gardens for children to find.

The Energizer Bunny began in 1988 as a parody of which rival battery brand's pink rabbit?

Duracell had run its bunny ads since 1973 but let the US trademark lapse, so Energizer registered its own; today the Duracell Bunny is used almost everywhere except the United States and Canada.

What instrument does the Energizer Bunny beat?

A bass drum, beaten without pause, is the whole joke: after its first ad the bunny kept wandering onto the sets of realistic-looking commercials for made-up products and interrupting them.

Since 1959 a cartoon rabbit has been told which cereal is 'for kids'?

Trix got its rabbit from an advertising illustrator who drew the 1959 storyboard, wrote the line 'Silly rabbit! Trix are for kids', and later co-created the cartoon superhero Underdog.

In The Velveteen Rabbit, what does the Skin Horse say makes a toy Real?

A child's love, kept up for a long, long time, is his answer; in Margery Williams's 1922 story the rabbit earns it, is nearly burned after the boy's scarlet fever, and is made a living rabbit by a fairy.

After his garden raid, Peter Rabbit is put to bed by his mother with what?

Mrs Rabbit doses Peter with a spoonful of chamomile tea because he feels poorly; his better-behaved sisters Flopsy, Mopsy and Cotton-tail get bread, milk and blackberries for supper.

Disney cast four-year-old Peter Behn as a young rabbit in which animated film?

Bambi's makers found the boy's delivery so lively that the fawn's rabbit friend, written as a bit part, grew into a star and pulled the whole film toward its young animals.

The critically endangered riverine rabbit is found only in the scrublands of which country?

South Africa's Karoo is the riverine rabbit's only home; unlike its famously fertile relatives, a female may raise just one young a year, part of why it is among the world's rarest mammals.

The snowshoe hare's boom-and-bust population cycle is famously tied to which predator?

Hudson's Bay Company fur returns spanning decades show Canada lynx numbers rising and falling a year or two behind snowshoe hare numbers on a roughly ten-year cycle, a textbook predator-prey case study.

Mary Toft's 1726 claim to have given birth to rabbits was satirised in 'Cunicularii' by whom?

William Hogarth's 1726 print Cunicularii, or The Wise Men of Godliman in Consultation, mocked the doctors taken in by Toft of Godalming, Surrey, who had fooled Nathaniel St André, surgeon to George I, before confessing.

Which US president used a paddle to shoo off a swimming rabbit that the press dubbed the 'killer rabbit'?

Jimmy Carter was fishing near his Georgia home town in 1979 when a swamp rabbit swam at his boat, 'hissing menacingly'; the Washington Post put the story on its front page.

The White Rabbit mistakes Alice for his housemaid and calls her by what name?

Mary Ann is the housemaid the flustered White Rabbit takes Alice for, ordering her home to fetch his gloves and fan; once inside she drinks from a bottle and grows until she fills the house.

Which author recorded the Br'er Rabbit tales in the 19th century, narrated by 'Uncle Remus'?

Joel Chandler Harris, an Atlanta journalist, published Uncle Remus: His Songs and His Sayings in 1880, retelling African-American folktales he had heard as a teenage apprentice on a Georgia plantation.

Miffy, the minimalist picture-book rabbit, was created in 1955 by which Dutch artist?

Dick Bruna made up Miffy on a seaside holiday, telling his young son stories about a rabbit they had seen in the dunes; he then drew her in a few black lines and flat colours.

The Holland Lop was created by crossing the French Lop with which other breed?

The Netherland Dwarf supplied the small size: the Dutch breeder de Cock began the cross in 1949, and the Netherlands' rabbit council recognised his miniature lop in 1964.

Oolong, a Japanese rabbit who became an early internet celebrity from 1999, was famous for doing what?

Balancing objects on his head was what his owner called 'Head Performance'; the first item, in 1999, was a film canister, later followed by dorayaki pancakes.

Bunnicula, the children's-book rabbit, is suspected of being a vampire because he does what?

Sucks the juice out of vegetables is the charge laid by Chester the cat, who makes repeated attempts on the bunny's life, while Harold the dog narrates the whole affair.

In which 2001 film does a human-sized rabbit named Frank warn a troubled teenager that the world will end?

Donnie Darko, with Jake Gyllenhaal as the teenager, was no commercial success on its release, but it went on to build a devoted cult following.

In Zootopia, what is rookie officer Judy Hopps assigned to do on her first day?

Issue parking tickets was Chief Bogo's way of sidelining the force's first rabbit officer; in early drafts the fox Nick Wilde was the lead, and the two roles were flipped late in production.

In Japan's White Hare of Inaba myth, the hare tricks which animals into lining up as a bridge?

Sharks is the usual reading of the Kojiki's wani: the hare dares them to line up so he can count their clan, hops across their backs, then gloats too soon and loses his fur.

In Chinese folklore, the Moon rabbit Yutu keeps which goddess company?

Chang'e fled to the Moon after taking her husband's elixir of immortality; there the Jade Rabbit keeps her company, forever pounding more of the elixir with a pestle.

By North American tradition, which foot of a rabbit makes the lucky charm?

The left hind foot is the one; strictures add that the animal should be shot or caught in a cemetery, some say on a rainy Friday, or with a silver bullet.

The original paella, cooked with rabbit and chicken instead of seafood, comes from which Spanish region?

Valencia's rice farmers are thought to have invented paella as a one-pot field meal made from whatever was to hand: rabbit, chicken, snails and beans.

What is 'Welsh rabbit', an 18th-century dish that contains no rabbit at all?

Melted cheese on toast is all it is; the name, often said to be a jibe that the Welsh were too poor for meat, came first, and 'rarebit' is a respelling that appeared in the 1780s.

John Updike's Harry 'Rabbit' Angstrom was once a high-school star in which sport?

Harry 'Rabbit' Angstrom was a high-school basketball star in Mt. Judge, Pennsylvania; in Rabbit, Run (1960) he is 26, demonstrating the MagiPeel kitchen gadget, and bolts from his pregnant wife on impulse.

Marsh rabbit numbers in the Everglades have fallen because of which invasive predator?

Burmese pythons were tied to the collapse by a 2015 study that radio-tracked marsh rabbits in the Everglades and found the snakes were their main killers; where pythons are common, the rabbits have mostly vanished.

A hare less than a year old is called what?

A leveret is a hare in its first year; hares are born furred and open-eyed in a shallow 'form' in the grass, unlike baby rabbits, born blind and naked in a burrow.

Which Hollywood actor became co-owner of the South Sydney Rabbitohs rugby league club in 2006?

Russell Crowe, a supporter since childhood, took over the struggling Rabbitohs with businessman Peter Holmes à Court in 2006; in 2014 the club won its first premiership in 43 years.

Who voiced Peter in the 2018 live-action/animated film Peter Rabbit?

James Corden voiced Peter; within days of release, allergy groups demanded an apology from Sony for a scene in which the rabbits pelt their enemy with blackberries, knowing he is allergic.

Lola Bunny, Bugs's girlfriend, made her first appearance in which 1996 film?

Space Jam introduced Lola as a new recruit to the Tune Squad whom Bugs falls for at once, with Kath Soucie supplying the voice and a catchphrase warning never to call her 'doll'.

Richard Adams's 1972 rabbit epic is set in which English county?

Hampshire holds the real hill of the title, a chalk down near the village of Kingsclere; the rabbits cross the real River Enborne to reach it and later flee Efrafa by punt down the River Test.

In Richard Adams's rabbit epic, the rabbits' own language is called what?

Lapine, the rabbits' tongue, has one word, 'hrair', for every number above four, which is how the runt Fiver gets his name, Hrairoo, 'Little Thousand'.

Who sang 'Bright Eyes', the hit from the 1978 animated film of Richard Adams's rabbit novel?

Art Garfunkel sang 'Bright Eyes', which composer Mike Batt was asked to write as a song about death for the film; it sold over a million copies as Britain's best-selling single of 1979.

Which villain is the Black Knight in the Oscar-winning Knighty Knight Bugs (1958)?

Yosemite Sam guards the Singing Sword with a dragon whose cold makes it sneeze fire; one last sneeze among the explosives blasts Sam and the dragon towards the Moon.

Mel Blanc said Bugs Bunny's accent mixed the Bronx with which other New York City borough?

Brooklyn and the Bronx were Blanc's own recipe, though director Tex Avery said he had asked for the voice of film actor Frank McHugh rather than a New York accent as such.

What weapon finally kills the Rabbit of Caerbannog?

The Holy Hand Grenade of Antioch is King Arthur's answer in Monty Python and the Holy Grail (1975), thrown only after the rabbit has killed several of his knights.

Pet rabbits are banned in which Australian state?

Queensland makes it illegal to keep a rabbit as a pet, a legacy of the damage feral rabbits do; permits exist only for purposes such as research, public display, circuses and magic acts.

A rabbit-killing virus swept France from 1952 after one estate owner infected how many wild rabbits?

Two rabbits were enough: Paul-Félix Armand-Delille only meant to clear his own estate, but the virus escaped, swept France and reached Britain the following year.

Rabbit hemorrhagic disease was first described in 1984 in Angora rabbits imported to which country?

China reported the first outbreak in 1984, in Angora rabbits shipped from Germany; the virus went on to spread around the world and was later used on purpose in Australia to cull wild rabbits.

'Rabbit fever', which hunters can catch while skinning game, is the common name for which disease?

Tularemia earned the nickname because hunters often pick it up through cuts while handling infected rabbits and hares; ticks and deer flies spread it too, and antibiotics cure it.

Taxidermists in Douglas, Wyoming, popularised which mythical horned rabbit in the 1930s?

The jackalope began when Douglas Herrick and his brother fixed deer antlers to a jackrabbit; real rabbits can grow horn-like tumours, caused by a virus, which may explain older horned-hare tales.

Which species is the most widespread rabbit in North America?

The eastern cottontail has the widest range of any American rabbit, from southern Canada to northern South America, helped by a breeding rate that lets one female raise several large litters a year.

In US television ads, the Cadbury Bunny does what?

The bunny clucks like a chicken, a hint at where the Creme Eggs come from; other pets have since auditioned for the part in annual tryouts, and the 2021 winner was Betty, a tree frog.

Hebrew 'shfanim', rendered as rabbits in early English Bibles, actually refers to which animal?

The hyrax is the small rock-dweller meant in Leviticus and Proverbs; translators who had never seen one borrowed the name of an animal they knew, though its nearest living relatives are elephants.