About the hare and hare offspring. Hares
By biology, behavior and way of life all kinds hares similar to each other. These are animals that predominantly lead a twilight and nocturnal lifestyle.
The hare lies all day in some secluded place, and only in the evening rises and begins an active life. During the night, he avoids a few kilometers and will visit a wide variety of lands. He then feeds, or, as they say, fats, then just walks and frolics.
The places of his nightly adventures usually do not coincide with the places of daytime rest - during the day the animal needs shelter, at night - food and the ability to run. However, sometimes living a few days on an area of only 1-2 hectares.
Depending on the local conditions and season of the year hares eat different types of feed. Summer they are seduced plots of land with rich grass, because at this time the basis of feeding hares is grassy vegetation. Therefore, even white hares come to the meadows and glades for fat, in the midlands or on the edges, where the grasses are more diverse and nutritious. In winter in food hares are becoming increasingly important wood-branch feed: young shoots and bark of various types of trees and shrubs. For the white hare, they become the main feed. though it uses them, it prefers to feed on the shoots of winter crops, aftermath, weeds and weed seeds. But this food is not averse to other types of hares.
It is in winter that the tracks of hares are especially numerous on the roads along which hay is carried, and near the stacks, if they are available in the grounds. On the roads, hares not only pick up the remains of hay, they are attracted by the increased soil salinity or snow, soaked in the urine of domestic animals. Salt starvation hares - a common phenomenon. In winter, the roads like hares and because they are easier to run. The whites themselves make permanent paths for themselves, which they regularly go from one part of the forest to another. In addition, hares, and more often other hare, use the roads to escape from danger - it is easier to confuse and cover the trail.
Resting places hares
Fortified and raid during the night, the hare with the dawn goes to look for resting place. In most cases, he settles there, where on the one hand it is difficult to approach him unnoticed, on the other - he is safely hidden from the vigilant eyes of a predator. Hares rarely lie among continuous, dense thickets of undergrowth or underbrush, bushes, weeds and high grass. More often, they choose a separate curtain or separate bush among more or less sparse vegetation. Favorite places of lezek at Rusak are interi, overgrown with thick grass, blemishes preserved among the arable land, bushes, deep furrows, and also the edges of the forest or shrubs. In winter, the hare willingly lays down at the snow blowing in which it digs for itself a shelter.
Mating period in rabbits
The hare lifestyle remains constant throughout most of the year. But there are days when his behavior changes dramatically. it mating periodwhen caution and "prudence" leave hares. Almost all day, especially in the morning and in the evening, not to mention the night, they rush on grounds in search of a couple. A hare is usually pursued by several birds with one stone, between which fierce fights take place because of the long-haired beauty. The female is often covered in a row by several males.
During the rut, it constantly happens to see groups of hares of four, five and more animals together. They are so busy with their business that they let them come very close, and even they themselves almost run into close quarters. Usually the hare is silent and his mournful cry can be heard either when he is injured or when he is caught in the claws or teeth of a predator. But engaged in mating games, hares often give a voice that resembles a thin neigh.
Breeding hares
Hares breed quickly. Where summer is long enough, females give three or even four litters per year. In colder places, the number of litters is reduced to two and even to one. The duration of pregnancy in all species of hares is about 50 days. In each litter on average is from three to seven hares with fluctuations from 1 to 12.
Hares of the first litter, born in March-April, are almost the same size as adult hares in the hunting season. Hunters call them " nastovikami". The next litter - in late June - early July gives “ letnikov», « kolosovikov" or " herbalists". Finally, the hare of the third (or most recent) litter is called “ leaf fall».
It would seem that with such a breeding intensity, the hares would have to breed incredibly. However, the “hare” years, when the animals are found at suitable sites almost at every step, are relatively rare. And there are many reasons for this.
Enemies hares
The hare is a creature rather defenseless and of enemies he has a lot. Both adult individuals and young hares, which begin a more or less independent life from 10–14 days of age, suffer greatly from predators.
Wolves, lynxes, foxes, stray dogs and cats, large feathered predators, both day and night, are all averse to eating a hare and cause a lot of hares significant damage. But this is not important.
Hare disease
The main scourge of hares - massive diseases. Various pulmonary and intestinal helminthiases (helminthic diseases), tularemia, pasteurellosis and coccidiosis sometimes they mow hares. Often, animals in large areas are killed almost completely, it takes several years for their numbers to recover.
It is interesting that the more hares at the moment of appearance of the mora, the more perilous its consequences are. The disease is rapidly spreading, becoming massive. In the same place where the number of hares is small, epizootics occur less frequently and their consequences are not so devastating.
Climate vicissitudes
In addition to diseases, hares are destroyed, and sometimes en masse, all sorts of the vicissitudes of climate. Late spring frosts, rainy and cold weather in the first days of the life of young animals cause an increased mortality of hares. If spring came early and then was replaced by a cold snap with a blizzard or rain, then first broods die almost completely. On the contrary, an early, warm and friendly spring is very favorable for increasing the number of hares.
In the vast floodplain lands in spring, hares suffer greatly from high floods. Hollow water quickly arrives, flooding everything around. Hares get off on the hills and manes turned into islands by dozens, and even hundreds. However, the area of dry places all decreases. Soaked, hungry, shaking from the cold, the animals climb on the stumps, on the branches of the trees accessible to them, on anything that even rises above the water. They sit on floating logs and remains, cut off from the land and completely helpless. It is good if the flood quickly subsides, otherwise the hares cannot escape death.
In such a hopeless situation for hares, they are often attacked by feathered predators. And not only real predators. Insolent crows and even magpies, gathered together in whole companies, do not give the exhausted victims of the flood a moment of rest and, sometimes, slaughter them to death. At the same time, the animals gathered on the islands were shot, hunted by dogs and beaten with sticks in enormous numbers. Fortunately, with such a wild practice these days is over.
In the deep snowy, wintered winters, and especially in the presence of crust, hares, mainly hare and thaw, become difficult to obtain food. Through the icy, thick layer of snow, they can’t get to the bottom of fresh shoots of winter bread, or last year’s rags and small shrubs. The animals go hungry and, if there are no hay barns nearby, haystacks or high fodder vegetation not covered by a blizzard, the hares are dying from hunger.
Hares are threatened with many misfortunes, therefore, in spite of all their “fecundity”, they have not filled and do not fill land suitable for their lives. The average annual increase in the number of hares is not so great. It does not usually exceed 100% of the original livestock, i.e., for the hunting season, for each adult hare there is one profitable one.
The number of species of hares
The number of species of hares over the years is changing dramatically. Then many of them, then, as a result of some kind of next misfortune, there is almost no. These ups and downs of numbers repeat more or less regularly, at regular intervals. They are extremely unfavorable for reference for a hare planned hunting.
Biotechnical receptions for maintenance of a population of hares
To support the stock of hares at a high enough level, some exist and practice biotechnical techniques.
Thus, in order to prevent the occurrence of mass epizootics, it is practiced to attract hares (by organizing top dressing and arranging solonets) to drier and elevated areas of land, where the possibility of infection with various helminths is less. With the help of the same measures, before the start of the spring flood, we can drag the hares out of the flood plains, where many of them could have died. A good effect is obtained by catching hares captured by the flood, which are then released into areas unoccupied by water. In the deep snow and at the crust of starving animals, the feeding of grain by waste, twigs, and hay is organized. In addition, clearing the green plow with a snow plow is very useful, which, by the way, is fully consistent with the snow retention work.
It is also necessary to strictly regulate the number of predator species that cause significant damage to the population of hares in each specific environment.
It is equally important to regulate the number of hares themselves. To keep their quantity in the grounds from year to year at the optimum level, not to allow either over-exploitation or excessive increase in the number is a very important task. It is solved by carrying out the above-listed biotechnical measures and continuous monitoring of the density of hares in the grounds with strict shooting control. Hares are harvested in many ways. For their catching, there are a number of autosols, but they are used, of course, when hunting, for commercial purposes, c. For successful hunting it is necessary to study well the hares' lifestyle. Sports hunting for these animals in most cases is carried out with a gun and dogs or without dogs.
The hare is a favorite object of hunting in different nations for many centuries. This smart little animal requires from the hunter not only an instant reaction, but also an excellent knowledge of habits. All this together will help in the field. Of the many varieties of hares, the most common in Eurasia are the two main species - the hare and the hare. We will tell about their habits in more detail.
Appearance
Hares - animals 50-70 cm long, and in the normal state, they compactly pick up long hind legs and look smaller. They have rather long ears: they are more elongated in the hare, the hare is slightly rounded. Also, the tail of the first longer, the second round short. Weight of adult animals can reach 7 kg. The coat color is gray in summer with a brown-red tinge and a dark stripe along the ridge of the hare, in the winter light gray. The white hare is light gray in summer, and becomes snow-white for winter, only the tips of the ears are dark. The hares' fur is thick, not very long, and fluffy - in former times the animals were the object of fishing to no small degree because of the skins from which they sewed clothes and various blankets, carpets, bedding.
The eyes of the hare, like most of the herbivores, are located on the sides of the head. Thus, a wide breadth of the review is achieved. However, the hare does not have binocularity and accuracy of view, therefore it can fly on a tree or other obstacle at great speed.
Sweat glands in the oblique are on the soles of the feet. Therefore, it is impossible to sense a hidden hare in dry weather. But on the run, but when the humidity increases the smell. Therefore, it is in wet weather hunting with dogs that act on the basis of flair is considered the best.
Habitat:
- Rusak - steppes, meadows, fields, flat terrain with good visibility;
- Belyak - forests, thickets, weeds, where you can hide well.
He has many natural enemies - wolves, foxes, birds of prey, so he learned to run and dodge perfectly.
Rescue from danger
The hare is considered a symbol of cowardice. In fact, oblique, zatavshis, not in a hurry to run away, if he feels the danger. He hopes that the hunter or the natural enemy will not notice him. And only with a direct threat takes a run. The animal runs pretty fast, at a speed of up to 60 km / h. Moreover, the hare will be carried along a straight high long jump. Only when it turns out to come off, he will try to confuse the trail and go sideways again with a long jump. Whitefish will immediately begin to stray and confuse the trail, running in circles and zigzags, arranging double and triple loops. Then he will try to lie low in a secluded place in the hope that he has completely confused his pursuer.
For dogs, such hare tricks can become an insurmountable obstacle. More precisely, the not very experienced assistants of the hunter, sometimes realizing that they cannot understand the hinges, leave a trail and return to the owner with nothing. For experienced dogs, as well as the hunters themselves, reading the tracks is a curious, exciting puzzle game that, with great effort, can be solved.
The hares have such a feature: he tries to save himself from predatory quadrupeds in advance, barely conceiving them. The same applies to dogs. But if he sees a kite, he tries to lie down in a quiet place. As a tall man, for a hare, he is associated with a danger from above, so he can also lie down and keep in hiding until the last. This is especially true for females. Practically every hunter, especially those who work without a dog, got into a situation when the hare jumps out from under his feet. So lurked to the last. Here you need to quickly react and shoot.
Another feature that all hunters know - while running away from the place of laying, with a scythe, after several laps, will try to go back again. What is taken into account when hunting. And in good places to rest after the extraction of one hare, after a while, meet another.
Beds and feeding
Hares prefer to spend the day on the couch in a secluded place. In the evening, go up to feed. During the night, the scythe is able to run several kilometers. However, it is usually not removed far from the place of rest, preferring to feed on an area of approximately one hectare.
Various herbs go to feed to hares - animals eat them in the summer. In winter, hares eat wood-branch feed, that is, shoots of bushes, tree bark. If possible, eat winter crops if they can get to them, as well as seeds, grains, fruits of plants. In general, in the cold season, when there is a shortage of feed, hares have a bad time if it is impossible to find a hayloft or something similar nearby. That is why in the winter months a lot of hare tracks can be found on forest roads near villages and along transport routes: slanting pick up pieces of hay and straw lost during transportation. In addition, it is more convenient to move along the roads, and the tracks are easier to hide.
In the morning, after fattening, hares return to the place of rest. The beds are usually arranged wisely: so that they have an overview of the terrain. Hare overgrown with thick grass between fields, bushes, furrows, forest edges. In the continuous thickets of grass, weeds animals climb less often. In winter, when there is snow all around, they fall near the nodule tubercles, often dig holes in the snow.
If the hare takes shelter after the chase, it usually lies face to its tracks in order to immediately detect it in the event of the appearance of the pursuer. On a windy day, the animal will face its face to the wind, so that the cold does not blow through the fur coat.
Breeding
There is a time when cautious hares freak out and even rush to and fro during the day, forgetting about the danger. This is the mating season, the time when the beasts are looking for a mate. Usually several males run after the female, sometimes I arrange fights among themselves. By the way, a few hares can cover a single hare. During the rut, the hares can give voice, the chosen hare male plays catch-up with her, fluffing the tail
These animals begin to multiply in very early spring, when snow has not completely melted. Then during the summer, give two more litters, and sometimes three more. About five to eight babies are born at a time, the first litter is smaller. Unlike baby rabbits, hares are born large, sighted, in wool, rather independent. The mother feeds them with nutritious fat milk, then the hare hides and spends several days in a daze. In total, they get a little milk for their childhood, 3-5 servings. And feed the baby can and someone else's hare, who was next. Native mother in the nest, like a hen or cat, does not sit with the baby, at best, is nearby. It can distract enemies by clutching. Cubs from the first day are able to feed on grass.
Many hares die in childhood from various enemies, trim animals and diseases, and adverse weather conditions - winter hunger, spring floods. As a result, with a huge fecundity, overpopulation with these animals was not observed. If everything works out for a particular individual safely, the hare can live in nature for up to ten years.
Characteristic type Hare-hare,
Lepus timidus Linnaeus, 1758.
According to J. R. Ellerman, T.C.S. Morrison - Scott (1951), a total of 16 subspecies of the hare are described, of which 11 are for the former USSR [Pavliny, 1971; Mammals .., 1980; Konev, 1983; Pavlinov, Rossolimo, 1987; Gromov, Erbaeva, 1995].
A modern hare species is found in the Upper Pleistocene on the Ural River. Geographical distribution The family covers Greenland, Scandinavia, Ireland, Scotland, northeastern Poland, isolated in the Alps and the Pyrenees, Eurasia, North and South America, Africa, Australia and many islands where animals were released for acclimatization in different years [Lavrov, 1981 ; Lavrov, Kolosov, 1979].
In Russia, the white hare lives in the north up to the coast of the Arctic Ocean, to the east the border passes along the southern edges of the forest zone through all of Siberia to the Pacific Ocean (Appendix 1, Fig. 1.). It occurs everywhere in Kamchatka, also along the coast of the Sea of Okhotsk and on Sakhalin. The white hare is common in Northern Mongolia, Northeast China, Japan (Hokkaido), the northern part of North America and on the west coast of Fr. Greenland [Bobrinsky et al, 1965; Flint et al., 1970; Heptner, Sludsky, 1972; Zykov, 1972; Krivosheee 1976; Ravkin, Lukyanova, 1976; Konev, 1983; Animal Life / Ed. Bannikova, 1984; Gromov, Erbaeva, 1995; Ravkin et al., 1996]. In the Kustanai region and in the North of Aktobe, there is an intermediate subspecies between L. t. Timidus and L. t. Sibiricorum [Ravkin et al., 1996]. Altai form L. t. lugubris Kasasch on modern views [Naumov, 1947, 1994; Flint et al, 1970] no different from L. t. Sibiricorum.
Description of appearance.
The skull is massive and wide. The occipital part is wide and flattened. The lateral sides of the frontal bones in front of the supraorbital processes are depressed.
The lower jaw is massive, with a sharply raised articular process. The teeth of the hares are adapted for chewing rough and solid feed. Molars only cut food and fray slightly. The complex structure of the cecum and the enhanced activity of the digestive tract compensates for the weak grinding of the food by the teeth. When keeping hares in captivity, a false chewing gum was revealed (coprophagy) [Naumov, 1947; Konev, 1983].
In functional and morphological terms, the white hare has much in common with the brown hare. However, there are differences due to the originality of their main biotopes and ecology [Berezin, 2003e, f, e]. The skeleton of the hare's limbs has structural features due to specific habitats: forests of various types, dense low forest, cuttings, burning, with fallen tree trunks, tall grasses, etc. Limbs, especially the rear ones, have longer middle and distal links.
The development of the muscles of the back and limbs due to the steeper jump trajectory of the white hare ranks first in relation to other hares.
The ear is slightly dilated and relatively short - pressed to the head, reaches only the end of the muzzle or comes forward a little. The size of the hare varies considerably depending on the range. The largest white hares live in Western Siberia: their weight reaches 5.5 kg, the smallest inhabit the taiga of Yakutia, their weight is 2.5-3 kg. The average weight is about 3 kilograms, length up to 65 cm.
Body length from 44cm to 74cm; tail length from 4.9 cm to 10.8 cm; foot length from 13.2 cm to 19 cm; ear length from 7.5 to 10.0 cm. The cocks are slightly larger than the males. The average weight of males is 3.7 kg, the average weight of females is 3.9 kg [Kuznetsov, 1975; Strokov, 1966; Oliger, 1971; Peacock, 1971; Kapitonov, 1980; Mammals .., 1980; Some information .., 1995; Sokolov et al, 1994].
Summer hair coloring on the back is reddish-gray, gray or gray-gray, sometimes with a dark brown streakiness. The head is colored the same way as the back or slightly brighter. On the sides of the head there are no dark and white spots. The front of the muzzle and cheeks are ocher-red or rust-red. The front part of the muzzle and cheeks is light brown, which is due to the presence on the top of the guard hairs a wide (one third of the hair length) of a light yellow-brown color, which ends in darkening. The base of this hair is dark
The number of vibrissae on the lips from 31 to 48 on each side. From 4 to 6 vibrissae of dark color with a length of 16-42 mm are located in the brow, from 3 to 6 - on the back of the cheeks, their length is 12-48 mm. In addition, there are a number of very short vibrissae on the cheeks and lips [Mammals ... / Ed. A.A. Sludsky and E.I. Strautman, 1980].
The ears are dark brown with a white stripe on the outer edge and a black top. Around the eyes is a narrow whitish or whitish-ocher ring. The lips, chin and upper part of the throat are white or greyish-white. The sides of the neck are greyish or rust-gray with ocher ripples. The back of the head and upper side of the neck are ocher-red or grayish-brown. The belly and the inside of the legs are white. Paws are light gray with a reddish or ocher hue. The tail is white or sometimes slightly darkened on top of a mixture of brownish hair; the overall shape of the tail is round, not wedge-shaped, like other types of hares. The upper surface of the tail without a dark or black spot on the upper side [Gromov, 1952; The Reds, 1963; Kolosov, 1979; Rukovsky, 1988; Sabaneev, 1992 a, b, c; Sokolov et al., 1994; Ananyev, 2000]. The color of the West Siberian white hare is more or less homogeneous and slightly differs from the Kazakhstan one [Ravkin, 1996]. The color of the hare in summer is darker than the hare, the tips of the ears are black, and there is no black spot on the short rounded tail.
Winter hair white white (except for the black tips of the ears). The greatest length of hair is on the belly, the shortest is on the head and the limbs. All categories of winter hair (guide, guard, down) are longer than summer. For example, the winter guides on the rump have an average length of 43.5, in the summer of 34.2, the guard ones, respectively, 39.6 and 27.1, the down ones, 25.1 and 16.2 mm.
In addition to the protective coloring, the hare has other adaptations to the habitat. The fingers are separated from each other in deep gaps, can be widely spaced. The length of the hind foot trail is 12-17 cm., Width is 7-12 cm. [Gromov, 1952; Formozov, 1946, 1989; Brem, 1992; Dinets, Rothschild, 1996]. Wide paws and feet, covered with thick bristles, provide him with good support in the snow.
Nutrition
about only three species make up the existence of a hare in winter in taiga conditions - willow (mostly bush species), aspen and birch. The frequency of their eating also depends on their predominance in the undergrowth and underbrush. Along the outskirts of overgrown fields, cavaliers of reclamation ditches, along rural and forest roads, on old forests where willow-trees prevailed, hares fed mainly on the shoots of these shrubs. On clearings renewed by aspen and birch, along the shores of lakes and rivers, where most of the Karelian hayfields are located, are dominated by gray alder, birch, aspen, mountain ash, and it is these breeds that form the basis of hare food here. Such dependence and limited composition of the main white hare feed, characteristic of taiga forests, were noted by many researchers, as well as the severity of geographic variation in hare feeding. Thus, in the more southern parts of the range, the share of aspen, willow, and birch hares in the ration is reduced, but hazel and oak become very important, more than 13% of the occurrence rate (i.e., 1947; Jurgenson, 1968), i.e. in the northern and middle taiga are not found at all.
Field signs The hind legs of the white hare are shorter, and the feet are much wider than those of the brown hare. On loose snow it leaves a very large footprint (more than 6 cm), widely spreads long toes of hind legs, imprints of traces of fore and hind limbs differ from each other less than that of a brown hare.
The location of the hind footprints is almost on the same level (i.e., more simultaneous support on them), rather than diagonally (a sign of a hare), increases the foot support area, thereby reducing the binding of the hare in the snow [Koneva, 1983; Formozov, 1989; Shilov, 1998]. The white hare travels mainly through loose deep forest snow or swampy soils.
Biotopes
In open spaces, the white hare is very rare, there must be water bodies in its habitats, as it does not settle far from the water. The most common type of biotopes is kostyanichny birchwood, willow birchwood, cereal birchwood, sedge birchwood, floodplains, breeches in low areas, reed marshes, and corn fields [Ivanov, Dryklonsky, 1968; Abramov, 2001].
Shedding.
It is well known that a white hare in Western Siberia molts twice a year. [Mammals .., 1980]. Spring molting in the southern regions of Western Siberia begins in early March. With the advance to the north (up to the tundra), the molting dates are shifted: the hare molts later - until about mid-April. Old hair becomes dry, rough and brittle, the down falls, although the core remains light. The peak of hair loss falls in the second half of April (for the southern regions), and the hair coat falls out like a whole matted shreds. The growing hair of the summer fur cover becomes noticeable at the end of March, the core in such places begins to darken. After about two weeks, the admixture of winter hair remains only on the upper part of the scruff, and the whole hare color becomes typically summer. The complete process of molting in a hare lasts 75-80 days. It can fluctuate in one direction or another for about 10 days. It depends on the physiological state of animals and weather conditions: in early spring - early molting, in cold and prolonged - late. Males molt before females [Utinov, 1973; Utinov, 1980].
According to the observations of A.A. Sludsky et al. [Mammals ... / Ed. A.A. Sludsky, E.I. Strautman, 1980]for captive hares, autumn molt occurs similarly to spring: It also, like spring, lasts 75-80 days. The appearance of winter hair is not directly related to the loss of summer, as they arise from new bulbs.
A hare in a year has 2, less often 3 litters of 4-6 each per hare [Aksakov, 1953 (1852); Cherkasov, 1990 (1884); Utinov, 1973; Mammals .., L 980].
The hare family (from the Latin “Leporidae”) [animal kingdom\u003e chord type\u003e mammal class\u003e placental infraclass\u003e hare-like squad] - mammals, hare-like representatives, the hare family includes a fairly large number of genera (23 extinct and 11 existing, in CIS countries are inhabited (s) by 9 extinct and 2 existing genera); The most common of these are childbirth: hares and rabbits. Other genera: Idah rabbits, American rabbits, African hares, tailless rabbits, Bushman hares, climbing hares, striped hares, stubby hares, South African rabbits. The habitat of these animals is very large, representatives of the hare family can be found in all parts of the world, with the exception of Australia. Many species have become commercial and are harvested in significant quantities, and some are considered pests of agriculture and forestry and carriers of a number of diseases that affect both humans and animals.
All anatomical features of the hare family are well studied and have been described in detail by many researchers. The average body length of a representative of this species ranges from 36 cm to 80 cm. All members of the family have relatively large auricles: 8–16 cm, which are covered with hair on both sides. But their tail is short, although it is clearly visible (there is only one exception - individuals of tailless rabbits (Romerolagus), they have no tails at all). Body color is very different in all genera of the family and primarily depends on the period of the year. In summer, it has shades of gray, sandy-gray, brown, black-brown or brown, and in winter, in one genera the color of the fur barely changes, in others the back of the body is lighter, in third (those who live in the north) the fur becomes completely white color 
The pads of the fingers are always covered with fur, all members of the hare family have 5 fingers on all the extremities. Nipples can be 3 or 4 pairs.
The structure of the musculoskeletal system has slightly more differences, depending on the genus to which a member of the hare family belongs. The cranial box of some genera is more flattened and massive, while others have the opposite - they have a slightly swollen brain capsule, i.e. the whole skull is lighter. The maxillary bones are lattice. Unlike pichukhovy (which are very similar to the hare externally), the hare nasal bones do not expand at all in the forward direction. The frontal bones are also strongly developed (in particular, their supraorbital processes). Hearing drums have a rounded shape and moderate size, the posterior process of the zygomatic bone is rather short, so it does not reach the auditory drums themselves. The mandibular bone of representatives of all genera is very wide. Both mandibular bones are fixedly connected. The anterior part of the mandibular branch is raised upwards, and along it there is a wide plate, the coronoid process.
In total, any member of the hare family has 28 teeth; dental formula - I 2/1, C 0/0, P 3/2, M 3/3. 
On the cutting edge of the first pair of upper incisors there is no deep excavation, but a longitudinal groove runs along it, which is filled with cement. The upper teeth (Р3 – М2) have an internal, entering fold, with a small folded structure along the edges. The lower (P3 – M2) are two conids with deep outer incoming folds that are connected on their inner side. Lower M3 - two conids, which are connected by cement.
Spinal column of the hares: Th 12, L 7, S 4, Cd 15–16. The hare rib cage is slightly shortened and compressed at the sides; their ribs are wide enough and flattened; clavicle fully rudimentary (reduced). The lumbar spine, as well as the sacral vertebrae, have high spinous processes. The sacrum is wide and relatively short, but its wings are well developed. All members of the hare family have relatively long tubular bones. The ulna is somewhat longer than the humerus (sometimes by 25%). The radius is the same in thickness as the ulna; the humerus is slightly compressed at the sides; In general, all parts of the forearm are very tightly connected along the entire length, i.e. there is no interosseous space as such. The hands of representatives of hares are rather long and narrow, the phalanges of the fingers are slightly elongated, the feet are long (they are almost equal to the length of the tibia). The first phalanx of 1 finger is almost equal in length with the tubercle of the calcaneus. The nameless bone of all members of the family is very massive due to the fact that it has a fairly wide wing, and the crest is poorly expressed and flattened. The iliac and sciatic regions are almost equal in size (the iliac is slightly longer). 
The length of the obturator orifice is slightly less than the length of the symphysis of the pubic bones. Another difference from the picaer is that the representatives of the hare family have a femur that is not so flattened from front to back. Most members of the hare family are fast-running animals and they have anatomical predispositions for this - the crest of the tibia has no coracoid process, and the bone does not have anterior-posterior bend.
The arch of the stomach is slightly elevated above the entrance to the esophagus and enlarged. If we draw a parallel with the anatomical structure of the pika and pertaining to this part of the animal's body, it is worth noting that the pyloric part of the hare's stomach is more narrowed than that of the picaoric. Also, unlike pichukhovyh, representatives of the hare family have a shorter and wider cecum, the spiral fold consists of a smaller number of coils, and the appendix is shorter and thicker. They also have a rather unusual shape of the villi of the duodenum, - they are densely arranged, undulatory curved plates.
