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A group of rabbits is known as a colony, [7] nest, or warren, [8] though the latter term more commonly refers to where the rabbits live. [9] A group of baby rabbits produced from a single mating is referred to as a litter [10] and a group of domestic rabbits living together is sometimes called a herd. [8]
The European rabbit is the only rabbit species that has been domesticated and all 305 global rabbit breeds— from Netherland Dwarf to Flemish Giant— are descendants of the European rabbit. Rabbits are an example of an animal that can be treated as a food, a pet, or a pest by different members of the same culture.
The riverine rabbit's scientific name is Bunolagus monticularis. [6] Some common names referring to it are the bushman hare and the bushman rabbit. [7] This rabbit also has less common names such as boshaas and vleihaas. These names arose from the habitats they lived in and are based on how these were moist and dense. [8]
Rabbits play an important part in the terrestrial food chain, eating a wide range of forbs, grasses, and herbs, and being part of the staple diet of many carnivorous species. Domestic rabbits can be litter box trained, and—assuming they are given sufficient room to run and a good diet—can live long lives as house pets.
Female rabbits can have one to seven litters of one to twelve young, called kits, in a year; however, they average three to four litters per year, and the average number of kits is five. [15] In the southern states of the United States, female eastern cottontails have more litters per year (up to seven) but fewer young per litter.
Hares have not been domesticated, while some rabbits are raised for food and kept as pets. Some rabbits live and give birth underground in burrows, with many burrows in an area forming a warren. Other rabbits and hares live and give birth in simple forms (shallow depression or flattened nest of grass) above the ground.
On average, domestic rabbits can live to be between 8 and 12 years old, says Blue Cross, a British animal welfare nonprofit. The oldest recorded domestic rabbit lived to be 18 years and 10 months ...
The Flemish Giant is an ancestor of many rabbit breeds from all over the world, one of which is the Belgian Hare, [1] which was imported into England in the mid-19th century. [2] The Flemish Giant was exported from England and Belgium to America in the early 1890s to increase the size of meat rabbits during the great "rabbit boom". [6]