I Was Shook After Finding a Living Surprise in my Front Lawn
After making a shocking discovery in my front yard I'll never mow the lawn the same way again.
I've lived in the Hudson Valley for over 30 years now and I'm still surprised every day by some of the wildlife that will stumble across my property. Whether it's an angry owl that refuses to let go of a rope or the world's biggest woodpecker pecking away at my tree, I never quite know what's waiting for me outside my front door.
This week I stumbled across something that was not only spectacular to see, but also somewhat terrifying. While walking outside to get something from my car I spotted something wiggling around in the front lawn. Thinking that it was just another snake traveling through the yard I continued to the car. But as I got closer, I realized that this was no snake.
Sitting between the blades of grass was the tiniest little rabbit I had ever seen. As I got closer I noticed another rabbit about five feet away in another section of the lawn. Now, I've heard that rabbits can make nests in the lawn, but this wasn't a nest and these weren't a baby rabbit, although he did look relatively young. If there was a nest in the lawn I would have found a large clump of dead grass where the rabbits' parents had hidden them from predators.
Realizing that I could mistakenly mow over these little guys, I became instantly terrified and had to find out why two tiny rabbits were just chilling out on my front lawn.
It turns out that these rabbits are perfectly fine, just maybe a bit naive. The Wildlife of Virginia says that young rabbits leave the nest and can live on their own in as little as two weeks. As long as the rabbit is more than four ounces and is larger than the size of a softball it's perfectly fine. The rabbits on my lawn were most likely just venturing out into the world for the first time and were chilling out in a quiet part of the lawn.
So be warned before the next time you mow that there could be some innocent young bunny rabbits hiding out in your lawn. You can be sure that I'm going to use some extra caution from now on whenever I cut the grass.
And for those of you who want a close-up of one of these little guys, here you go.