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Marsh Hare
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- Length
- 18 inches.
- Description
- Above yellowish-brown, with many black hairs scattered through the pelage. Underparts grayish, underside of tail grayish, never white as in the cottontail. Ears much shorter than in that species, and feet but scantily covered with hair.
- Range
- Coast of North Carolina to eastern Georgia and northern Florida.
- Range
- Southern Florida, grading into the former to the northward.
The marsh hare is an inhabitant of the low seaboard of our Southern States. It is slightly larger than the cottontail with which it is often associated, and differs in its nearly bare feet and more scanty pelage. It is distinctly an animal of the wet swamps, not hesitating to take to the water and plunge through the deepest bogs when disturbed. Bachman says that it runs low on the ground and cannot leap with the same ease, strength and agility as the cottontail. From the shortness of its legs and ears and its general clumsy appearance, as we see it splashing through the mud and mire, it somewhat reminds one of an overgrown rat.
Varieties of the Marsh Hare
1. Marsh Hare. Lepus palustris Bachman. Range and description as above.
2. Florida Marsh Hare. Lepus palustris paludicola (Miller & Bangs). Darker, with less buff in its colouration.