Volcano Rabbit - Habitat Management, Competition, & Cohabitation

Habitat Management, Competition, & Cohabitation

The IUCN/SSC Lagomorph Specialist Group has created an action plan for this rabbit (Fa & Bell, 1990). The plan focuses upon the need to manage the burning and overgrazing of the zacaton habitats and to enforce laws prohibiting the capture, sale and hunting of the animal. Studies are recommended into the geographical range, habitat relationships, population dynamics and life history (Fa & Bell, 1990). In addition, habitat restoration and the establishment of zacaton corridors to link core areas of habitat are needed. Captive breeding colonies exist at Jersey Zoo, UK and Chapultepec Zoo, Mexico City (Olney & Ellis, 1993).

Volcano rabbits are common at higher altitudes (Fa 1). Volcano rabbits are predominantly found in “pine-alder forest (70.9%),” but alder forest and grasslands are alternate homes for them (Fa 1; 6). Volcano rabbits occur in greater abundance around taller, dense herbs, and thicker vegetation, rather than areas exposed to “burning, grazing and logging.” (Fa 1;8). The volcano rabbit, according to Fa, “survives and probably evolved in grasslands confined to less than 280km2 in elevated areas in Trans-Mexican Neovolcanic Belt” (Fa 1). These “primitive lagomorphs,” relative large gnawing animals; distinguished from rodents by having two pairs of upper incisors specialized for gnawing, resembles Pliocene Nekrolagus and Tertiary rabbits (Fa 1). The cottontail rabbit, Sylvilagus, is expanding into the volcano rabbit’s range, which is the reason the volcano rabbit and the cottontail rabbit live within the same range (3) “Large areas within the volcano rabbit’s restricted range” Fa describes, “are undergoing increasing anthropogenic pressures” (Fa 3). Aside from human impact, in order to determine habitat use, Fa estimates the “faecal pellet cover” of the volcano rabbit (Fa 3). Relying on the size and shape helps scientists differentiate the volcano rabbit from the cottontail rabbit (Fa 5). The volcano rabbit is capable of “ entire runways with their pellets,” as well as create “latrines” for their pellets, which helps track the extent of their habitat (Fa 5). However, Fa notes how “the latrines contain pellets of different ages so a count would exaggerate use because of the permanence of older pellets” (Fa 11) Therefore, the latrines operate as useful locations to detect and track the “presence and relative abundance” of the volcano rabbit (Fa 11). Moreover, Fa explains, “For lagomorphs, cage trapping and netting are used for enumeration of individuals in different habitat types” (Fa 10). Around 1980, volcano rabbits were believed to be mostly living in “open pine forest with a dense herb later of clumped grasses,” but new data presents how they are more likely to occur in “mixed forests” (Fa 11). There is “no evidence that habitat selection is a response to competitive exclusion” with cottontail rabbits (Fa 12). However, there is a likelihood of displacement of the volcano rabbit, due to its endemic nature (Fa 12). Fa concludes, “as burning and logging increase so will the fragmentation of grasslands, making them more favorable” for other rabbits, rather than the volcano rabbit (Fa 12)