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black rabbit


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well i was quite chuffed to see it when i did,i hear plenty about lads takeing blackuns on the lamp but to date i havent seen one.

i expected this one to leg it but it just stayed put, firey enough when picked up all legs seem to work.

i think its an old boy possibly blind,dumped??i dont think he,d taste to clever.

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Plenty of blacks on my permission. They are (I assume) the result of some escaped pet, joining and mating with the wild ones some years ago. The babies are very attractive, fur is like velvet.

Probably not escapees mate. Genetic blips in wildies are not rare.Rabbits are not actually "brown" they only appear so.Look closely and you'll see a mixture of grey,black,white,cream hairs but no proper brown ones. Rabbits born with missing pigment tend to be either white -in which case they stand-out like beacons & tend to be knocked-off by predaters long before they manage to breed and pass on their genes- or black . In the past black wild(feral? ,naturalised? let's not get anoraky about terminology) rabbits were activly encouraged in some stately parks for their novelty value and on some island warrens for the value of their pelts for hat-making. Several superstitians have grown -up around them .Some call them "Vicars", others think it unlucky to kill one. Old Keepers liked to see a few about as they were easy to spot and if they went missing it indicated the activities of vemin ..or poachers!

Edited by comanche
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A few years ago we were living with my in-laws (farmers & father-in-law enjoys shooting., ferreting etc) when a guy came with two young rabbits - my two kids saw them before Father-in-law did, and thought F-I-L had got them some pets. (The guy who brought them bred show rabbits and used to bring F-I-L the ones that wern't up to the mark, F-I-L used to eat them) They were kept for a few months, but were vicious buggers, we've all got scars from their claws & teeth. One escaped a couple of time, and ended up in the pot -(it was the more vicious of the two) my kids loved the chicken pie Gran made that day!!!!!!!!!!! They still think 'Misty' is living wild on the farm! :whistling:

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I've seen black rabbits in droves, on Skomer Island. There's all sorts of colours there, hundreds of thousands of coney, well there was when I went there on a school trip, many moons ago! :D

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