March Cubs
In three hunts last week the day's sport was interrupted by the appearance of a vixen followed by her cubs. The experi- ence in the Oakley country was reported in The Times. The other almost simultaneous incidents had no publicity, I think. Every countryman knows that rabbits will breed 'in winter, but it is not perhaps generally realized that other mammals are frequently not less, or little less, precocious: The March hare is said to be mad because the pairs then chiefly indulge in the wild and hilarious gambols that accompany these courtings. • But this behaviour is, in part, evoked by the season. Hares frequently breed in February, sometimes quite early in February ; and in the year when personally I had most evidence of the appearance of February leverets the season was not peculiarly early. This is, of course, an abnormal spring. Young partridges were hatched out in March—one brood 'even earlier7-and so anticipated the standard date by a good month. Animals as well as plants have predated spring, but it remains that even in late years foxes are hunted for a great many weeks after the breeding season. Otter hunters,. who habitually transgress against Nature's close season, acknowledge the unseasonableness. Foxhunters are apt to deny that cubs ever appear much before May. The normal facts of biology are, I think, all
agiaftist their theory and• belief. • * * *
Previous page
