Believing In The Pygmy Bunny

[n2doc]

http://www.insidescience.org/polopoly_fs/1.2040!/image/187434486.jpg_gen/derivatives/landscape_490/187434486.jpg


Apr 20, 2011

By Juli Berwald
Inside Science News Service


(ISNS) -- Like the Easter Bunny, the Columbia Basin pygmy rabbit of Washington state may soon exist only in our imaginations. None have been seen in the wild since 2004. But a new breeding program is aiming to rebuild this endangered species into a thriving wild population.

With adults weighing barely a pound, the Columbia Basin pygmy rabbit is North America's smallest rabbit. Fragmentation of its habitat, along with disease and other stresses, sent the Columbia Basin population into a tailspin in the 1990s.

In 2001, the rabbit was listed under the Endangered Species Act. In a last-ditch effort to save the population, 16 of the remaining Columbia Basin pygmy rabbits were taken into captivity.

The Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife quickly set up breeding programs at Washington State University in Pullman, the Oregon Zoo in Portland, and Northwest Trek, a wildlife park south of Seattle. The plan was to raise enough pygmy rabbits to supply a reintroduction program in the Columbia Basin.

http://www.insidescience.org/research/believing-in-the-pygmy-bunny

[BlueJazz]

1. Humans love to breed until they are the cockroaches of the planet.

In this day and age, everytime I see large families, I want to thank them for shortening the human existance.

[flamingdem]

2. But these little cuties don't seem to "breed like rabbits"

what gives?

[Bigmack]

3. There must be "bunny porn" out there....

.. there certainly is every other kind.

Two little bunnies... each in their own old-fashioned bathtub..... some Al Green....

[flamingdem]

4. A little Barry White should get them hopping

His voice has helped many get some tail.

[BlancheSplanchnik]

8. yep, I couldn't agree more

I had a bumpersticker made once, "Mommy, where Does Overpopulation Come From?"...

but I didn't like the design the guy came up with, so I never bought one....

[kestrel91316]

5. Turn them into the latest trendy pet and the population problems will be over.

Just think what irresponsible owners and backyard breeders could do with them!

[Nederland]

6. That would totally work

Get Paris Hilton to start carrying one of these things in her purse and its a fait accompli...

[Generic Other]

7. OK before we get too happy over the cute bunnies

let us remember they will be released near the Hanford reservation and will go radioactive then have to be hunted down and exterminated. ACK.

That said, they are cute looking.