Dressed in an Alice in Wonderland T-shirt featuring the White Rabbit, Kallie Jackson laughs at its connection to her neighbourhood nickname.
“People know me for being the crazy bunny lady,” she said. “I can’t say ‘No’ to an animal in need.”
The Bradford West Gwillimbury resident and volunteer at Procyon Wildlife in Beeton, has been working for months with several homeowners in the town’s west end to track and capture a bunch of domestic rabbits that were released by their owner.
It all began while walking her dogs in late February, when she said she spotted two domestic bunnies, one black and one golden.
She said she called the town’s animal control, but enforcement officers are not allowed on properties to which they have not been called due to liability — and the bunnies can run fast through different locations.
Since then, she started knocking on doors and asking neighbours to keep a lookout for more lionhead and angora bunnies (they have long fur), which can have dozens of babies a season.
Now that the weather is warmer, she said she fears the area around Langford Boulevard and Brookview Drive could soon be overrun with rabbits if they are not caught and taken to proper homes or humane societies.
“Certainly by September there would be hundreds,” Jackson said, adding more bunnies in the area could attract more predators such as coyotes.
So far, she said she has found seven domestic rabbits and another three that froze to death in the winter.
The surviving rabbits have been taken to different locations, including the Alliston and District Humane Society, a foster home, and given to experienced bunny owners.
“(The neighbours) want to enjoy their properties without finding a bunch of dead bunnies,” she said.
Jackson said she has been working with the Alliston humane society and Cambridge-based Rabbit Rescue to properly catch and care for the bunnies she and other neighbours have managed to catch.
She said she is looking for one more she knows is loose — a dark brown female lionhead rabbit she suspects is pregnant.
“We’ve only seen her once,” Jackson said, adding “it’s hard to say if there are more we just haven’t spotted. Rabbits breed like rabbits.”
Since Easter, a time when some people buy bunnies as gifts, Rabbit Rescue has assisted with 83 dumped domestic rabbits, said its executive director Haviva Porter.
“Many were found dead, hit by cars, broken bones, etc,” she said.
Domestic rabbits are not the same as wild ones, and they cannot survive outside, according to the Rabbit Rescue website.
"People think they're a really easy pet to have," Jackson said. "They're actually quite intense to deal with. They can have behavioural issues."
Jackson said she hopes the local domestic-rabbit problem can be ended soon, and she said anyone who spots or captures a domestic bunny should contact Rabbit Rescue.
To learn how to tell the difference between domestic and wild rabbits, or how best to catch them, visit the Rabbit Rescue website.
