Wearing White out of Season

It’s not easy being a snowshoe hare. They make a tasty meal for a lot of predators at Beaver Hollow, including great horned owls, goshawks, foxes, coyotes and wolves. Luckily, the hares have an important survival tool – camouflage! Hares have a brown coat in the summer and fall that helps them hide in the forest underbrush. Their coat changes to white in winter to blend in with the snow. But as the climate changes here in northern Wisconsin, there are changes to the timing of snow cover, causing a mismatch of the hares’ coloration to their habitat. Recent research confirms that wearing white out of season causes a substantial decrease in survival for the hares.

Beaver Hollow is at the southern end of the snowshoe hares’ range, and the population of hares on the wetland property may decrease with continued years of mismatch between the hares’ coat and their habitat. It’s possible that the snowshoe hare may evolve to retain its brown coloration for a longer time period, but it’s also possible that the snowshoe hare’s range will simply move further north.