FRIENDS OF JAMAICA POND 36 Perkins St., PO Box 300040, Jamaica Plain, MA 02130-0030 Gerry Wright, Founder and President Telephone: 617-524-7070 Email: FrederickLawOlmsted@yahoo.com TTY/MA RELAY 800-439-2370 www.FriendsOfJamaicaPond.org

Friends of Jamaica Pond History and Annual Park Keeper Award Frederick Law Olmsted a one-man play by Gerry Wright Nature's Class Room: Environmental Education Projects Environmental Research Projects Forestry Protection Projects Emerald Necklace Bird Club Volunteer Stewardship Program Calendar and Meetings and Press Memberships and Donations Links and Resources Contact and Email Info

"Let it be not for present use and delight alone, but let it be of such a work that our descendents will thank us for it." Frederick Law Olmsted

Nature's Class Room: Environmental Education Projects Jamaica Pond's Albino Gray Squirrel Great Horned Owls Red Tailed Hawks Butterflies and Dragonflies Emerald Necklace Wildflowers Pink Lady's Slipper Great Blue Herons Emerald Necklace Fungi (Coming Soon)

Boston's Emerald Necklace Cottontail Rabbits New England Cottontail - Sylvilagus transitionalis Eastern Cottontail - Sylvilagus floridanus by Stephen Baird The Emerald Necklace has two species of Cottontail Rabbits - the New England Cottontail and the Eastern Cottontail.  The different species can only be fully determined by body measurements and DNA lab tests. Field identifications are only correct about 60-90 percent of the time by the New England Cottontail's brown forehead spot and brown ear stripes and the Eastern Cottontail's white forehead spot (See images below). Cottontail Rabbits Cottontail Rabbits are very common and can be found throughout Boston's Emerald Necklace from Boston Common to Olmsted Park to Franklin Park and many backyard gardens. I was photographing butterflies in the garden between the Jamaica Pond Boat House and Gazebo when this Eastern Cottontail emerged to bask in the setting sun.  I am always amazed of how nature finds its way into the smallest places and spaces... Eastern Cottontail Rabbits are not native to New England.  They were introduced in the late 1800s and again in the 1920s.  The native New England Cottontail has seen a dramatic 86 percent population decline from the increased competition by Eastern Cottontail Rabbits and habitat changes from farmland to forests.  Preserves including one on the Boston Harbor Islands are being set up to help protect the remaining New England Cottontail population. Named after the white tail Lives an average of 1.5 years in the wild. Oldest recorded wild cottontail lived 5 years.  Oldest captive cottontail lived 9 years. Rabbits are herbivores -- eating grasses, weeds, fruits, dandelions (see picture below) plus garden flowers, lettuce, and beet greens. In the winter they eat tree bark and buds. Rabbits also eat their own feces in order to improve plant material digestion (coprophagous). Reproduction: Males will set up territory by thumping the ground with their hind legs. Also will box rival males with front paws. Females build nest in shallow hollows, abandoned dens of other animals, stonewalls and rock crevices. Mate between March and September and have 3-4 litters of 3-8 kits. Young rabbits are born without fur, blind and deaf.  They leave the nest in 2-3 weeks and become completely independent in 4-5 weeks. Males and females do not actively care for young. Kits and young bunnies have an 85-90 percent mortality rate in the first year. Predators: Rabbits are a source of food for many reptiles, birds and mammals including people.  Great horned owls, red tailed hawks (see photo below), coyotes, foxes, are just a few of the predators here in the Emerald Necklace.  Crows, raccoons, skunks, and snakes hunt young rabbits. Unleashed dogs chase and kill adult and young rabbits. Literature and Folklore and Myth - Rabbits hop through books and stories and myth. Thornton Waldo Burgess, Massachusetts author and naturalist, wrote a series of Bedtime Stores Books - Old Mother West Wind with animal anthropomorphic characters including Peter Cottontail aka Peter Rabbit.  Visit the Burgess home sites Green Briar and Laughing Brook Nature Centers in Sandwich and Hampden.  Web site: http://www.thorntonburgess.org Beatrix Potter's The Tale of Peter Rabbit, written in letters for an ill child in 1893, has become a classic children's book. Brer Rabbit African-American and Native American folktales http://www.americanfolklore.net/folklore/brer-rabbit/ The Symbolism of Rabbits and Hares by Terri Windling is an erudite article that traces rabbit myths from ancient Egyptian temples to the Asian Moon Rabbits, Buddhist creation rituals to film trickster Bugs Bunny.  http://www.endicott-studio.com/rdrm/rrRabbits.html The Easter Bunny and colored eggs hunt derive from ancient and pagan vernal equinox rituals including the mythic fertility German goddess named Ostara and the Anglo-Saxon fertility goddess named Eostre. References U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service - New England Cottontail Rabbit at Risk. http://www.fws.gov/northeast/indepth/rabbit/index.html New England's Rabbit Loses More than 80 Percent of its Habitat: Peter Cottontail Disappears.  Science World Report, April 1, 2013 http://www.scienceworldreport.com/articles/5931/20130401/new-englands-rabbit-loses-more-80-percent-habitat-peter-cottontail.htm Cottontail has Lost more than 80 Percent of its Habitat http://www.natureworldnews.com/articles/1128/20130401/cottontail-lost-more-80-percent-habitat.htm Mass Wildlife - Massachusetts Division of Fisheries and Wildlife http://www.mass.gov/dfwele/dfw/wildlife/living/living_with_cottontails.htm Massachusetts Audubon Society http://www.massaudubon.org/Nature_Connection/wildlife/index.php?subject=Mammals&id=70 Connecticut Department of Energy and Environmental Protection. http://www.ct.gov/dep/cwp/view.asp?A=2723&Q=325996 National Geographic Society http://animals.nationalgeographic.com/animals/mammals/cottontail-rabbit/ NOTE:  8 x 10 matted and framed photographs are available for $100 membership donations or 11 x 17 matted and framed photographs are available for $500 membership donations to Friends of Jamaica Pond. Contact Stephen Baird at info@communityartsadvocates.org

Contact and Email Information

FRIENDS OF JAMAICA POND 36 Perkins St., PO Box 300040, Jamaica Plain, MA 02130-0030 Gerry Wright, Founder and President Telephone: 617-524-7070 Email: FrederickLawOlmsted@yahoo.com TTY/MA RELAY 800-439-2370 www.FriendsOfJamaicaPond.org