Sylivilagus transitionalis is in the family of the cottontail rabbits. You may commonly recognize them as the New England Cottontail. This cottontail is very similar to the Eastern Cottontail, but this cottontail also has its own characteristics. The New England Cottontail lives mainly in southern New England, Maine, and Connecticut. The following information is to teach you about what the New England Cottontail looks like, its population, and the feeding habits and predators.

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To begin with, this cottontail has many different colors such as: brown, light brown, red-brown, white, black, and grey. The adult  New England Cottontail is fifteen to nineteen inches long and weighs two to four pounds. Males and females usually look alike in size and color. They are active all day long but mostly at dusk and dawn. This species can hop up to eight feet high. These characteristics of the New England Cottontail aren’t the only cool thing about them, there is a lot more.

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Sylivilagus transitionalis or New England Cottontail must live somewhere. They live in four main states, New England, Maine, New York, and Connecticut. Usually they live in overgrown fields, farmland, and isolates weedy patches in cites. The places that they live are shrinking a great amount; their habitat has shrunk 86%. The loss of habitat is most likely caused by people taking down young forests. People who own private land can help restore this animal’s population by providing a nice area of land as part of this cottontail’s habitat. The New England cottontail has still managed to safely live and breed.

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What does the New England cottontail eat? This cottontail is low on the food web because they are very small and the only eat grass and clover. There are many animals that can eat them but choose not to. Eating their meals only in their habitat makes it easy for predators to find the cottontail. Coyotes, cats, wolves, and hawks find their way into eating them. Since the New England cottontails are small they are able to hide in a little burrow or hide behind a clump of dirt or even freeze in place.  Being low in the food chain is hard but this cottontail knows how to handle it.

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This animal is important because it helps feed other animals. That’s not all though, Sylivilagus Transitionalis an identifiable black spot in between their eyes. It can also make a low growling or purring sound. I think that even though this animal is small and low in the food chain it is still a wonderful part of nature.

 

Author: Davynn M.

Published 04/2013

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Sources:

 http://newenglandcottontail.org ,New England cottontail, Febuary 2, 9, 2013

http://www.nrcs.usda.gov/wps/portal/nrcs/detailfull/national/programs/?&cid=stelprdb1047040. New England Cottontail,  January , 2013

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_England_Cottontail. New England Cottontail Scientific Classification, January 29, 2013

http://www.fws.gov/northeast/indepth/rabbit/index.html. New England cottontail: Rabbit at Risk, January 26, 2013

Encyclopedia of north American animals, “New England Cottontail,” page 450

http://www.dec.ny.gov/animals/67017.html.New England Cottontail image, February 1, 2013