Brown Hare leveret - a photo on Flickriver

Brown Hare leveret

            I spotted this young leveret crouching low in the grass near Holmfirth this morning.  It was in a field next to a road, and I stayed on the road with the 420mm lens so as not to disturb it.  Brown Hares give birth to about three litters each year, producing one to four leverets in each litter.  Soon after giving birth, the mothers move 2-300m away, leaving their young leverets alone in the grass.  She only visits them to suckle about 50 minutes after sunset.  The young disperse up to 100m from their birthplace when they are a few days old, but the siblings meet up and play about 20 minutes before their mother arrives to feed them.  She only feeds them once every 24 hours, and that feed only lasts about 5 minutes.  Once they have fed the leverets disperse again. The young start grazing when they are 13-17 days old, and I can see that this one has been nibbling the nearby grass, so my guess of 2-3 weeks old is probably correct. The mother suckles them for about 5 weeks and they attain adult size after about 6 months.  This youngster would certainly have been dependent on its mother.  Bizarrely the mother licks up any urine produced by the leverets, presumably because the smell might attract predators, especially Fox.  Foxes are the main predator of young Brown Hares in Britain and take a staggering 80-100% of leverets produced each year.  This helps to explain why they are still uncommon when Does produce 4-12 young each year.
   

Taken on: July 23, 2020

Tags:

Lepus

capensis

Brown

Hare

leveret

Holmfirth

West

Yorkshire

Tim Melling « less

Sets appears in: • Explore • British Mammals

Groups appears in: • in explore

Stats: 18,444 views / 58 comments

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