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So I shot my first snowshoe hare of the season yesterday. Get this- it hadn't finished changing color yet. I've been out hunting three or four times now, and I've seen maybe 8 or 10 hares, none of which had fully switched to their winter coats. The one I got yesterday was only half changed.
My book learnin' tells me that the switch from summer to winter coats (and vice versa) is triggered by the length of sunlight in the day- as the days get shorter, they start getting their winter coats. Wouldnt' the time of year the switch takes place be pretty consistent, then? The last couple of years the rabbits had changed to pure white by the third week of October. Why the delay this year?
"People think it must be fun to be a super genius, but they don't realize how hard it is to put up with all the idiots in the world."
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vitus979: Nov 11, 04 16:31
Tanning beds in the borrows!
Chris
*********************
“Life should not be a journey to the grave with the intention of arriving safely in a pretty and well preserved body, but rather to skid in broadside in a cloud of smoke, thoroughly used up, totally worn out, and loudly proclaiming "Wow! What a Ride!”
― Hunter S. Thompson,
O honestly thought this would have something do with with being like bunny's and the biology related to the previous statement.
Vitus
There's probably a few additional environmental factors. Temperature and food sources may have something to do with it as well. Without knowing these I couldn't really speculate any further. I know that the cottontails in my area will change their diet as the foodsources change. We've had a great Indian Summer and they've had a longer summer diet than normal. Soon they'll be focused on my fruit trees.
However, I find the idea of hunting snowshoe bunnies fascinating. We have a plentiful cottontail population here in W. Michigan, but no snowshoe that I've ever seen. Do you hunt these with a dog? I used to have a Shetland Sheepdog that was a fair rabbit hunter. Oftentimes, he'd catch the bunnies and I wouldn't need to take a shot. Now I have a border collie that points!
Rocketboy
There's probably a few additional environmental factors.
Must be, I guess. It's been a warmer autumn than the past couple of years, so maybe that's affected their diet. Sure is making them hard to hunt right now.
Do you hunt these with a dog?
No, though I'm sure I'd get more hares with one. :) Before the snow starts, I basically just stomp around the woods looking for white fur. After the snow falls, I stomp around the woods looking for snowshoe tracks, then follow them until I find the hare. Neither method is real successful from a "number of hares bagged" point of view, but I find it rewarding.
"People think it must be fun to be a super genius, but they don't realize how hard it is to put up with all the idiots in the world."
There is probably a temperature variable involved. With the winter coat being heavier, a better insulator, and stark white, they would'nt want to change coats too early. I don't know where you are or what the weather has been like, but much of the country has been so mild that we (in Texas) have yet to see much in the way of ducks and geese, where normally the prairies are pretty thick by now.
Have you had a fairly mild winter so far?
Matt
Come to Michigan. You can have all the Canada Geese you want.
RB