Even bunnies need saving as record-breaking storms wreck havoc across California.
A crew from the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service has been traveling the Central Valley for months in an effort to save stranded riparian brush rabbits, a small, brown and white animal listed as an endangered species, from rising floodwaters.
The five team members have paddled out on rivers in the San Joaquin River National Wildlife Refuge from dawn till after dusk to save bunnies. Some of them are stuck on trees, bushes, or high land. They are then taken to higher ground as the river water level floods the region.
During operations in January and March 286 rabbits have been rescued, said Fumika Takahashi, wildlife biologist at the San Luis National Wildlife Refuge Complex, which includes the San Joaquin River National Wildlife Refuge.
More operations are planned for next week.
“These rabbits are resilient, they bounce back, but each one you rescue becomes important,” she said.
A few months have passed since the state experienced one of the wettest winters in recent memory before the rescue operation.
Riparian brush rabbits are especially vulnerable to floods because they live at the edges of rivers. They only live in a small area and there aren’t many of them, so events like this can have a big impact on their population and recovery.
Eric Hopson
The Fish and Wildlife Service stated that the riparian rabbit was thought to only be present in Caswell Memorial State Park and close to Lathrop. However, the species was reintroduced into the San Joaquin River National Wildlife Refuge, roughly 75 miles northeast of San Jose, despite having dangerously low populations.
“Riparian brush rabbits are especially vulnerable to floods because they live at the edges of rivers,” refuge manager Eric Hopson said in a statement. “They only live in a small area and there aren’t many of them, so events like this can have a big impact on their population and recovery.”
Living near rivers, the animals have evolved to be able to survive floods, Takahashi said, but not for extended periods of time as they’ve had to do so this year.
“They’re actually really good at climbing on vegetation and can even swim short distances,” she said. “But when we have these large floods, there’s very little high ground for them to escape to.”
Animals in the area have seen the San Joaquin River flood in the past, most recently in 2017. The rabbit can no longer escape upland due to climate change and the current landscape, which includes expanding farms. Rabbits no longer have a way to cross the river due to the levees, and the flooding has a direct impact on their habitat.
Because of this, authorities built “bunny mounds,” or high ground in flood-prone areas, where animals could flee during flood disasters. However, there isn’t much food available in these places, and the rabbits are occasionally vulnerable to predators.
In January, 37 of the rabbits were rescued from the mounds. In March, 110 were found in the mounds.
“The rescues this year have been especially significant for the endangered rabbits, considering the refuge estimates there are only 2,000 to 3,000 rabbits in the area,” said Takahashi.
The rabbits have been trapped and relocated to areas that are at least four to five feet higher than the flood plain and that are drier.
However, they have had to take care to prevent their rescue operations from exacerbating a population-wide problem. A highly contagious and fatal sickness known as rabbit hemorrhagic disease virus 2 has been affecting riparian brush rabbits since May 2022, according to vets. This disease has spread swiftly throughout the western United States.
To curb its spread, officials have vaccinated all of the rescued rabbits. But officials are also concerned that having more rabbits in a smaller area could advance the spread of the disease.
Erin Hagen, director of restoration science for River Partners, a nonprofit organization that has collaborated with the refuge on the rescues, said that altering the ecosystem of the environment, moving the rabbits, and increasing the concentration of their population could also mean other issues that haven’t yet been identified.
Officials are also concerned that climate change will leave the area more prone to flooding.
“Although they’re in a safe elevation, we’re not sure it’s threaded the needle on being on the other side and being completely safe,” Hagen said.
