(Betsy Bloom/Daily News photo) Snowshoe hares don’t directly compete with cottontail rabbits although the U.P. and northern Wisconsin marks a southern edge of the hare’s range.

Bigfoot has made a few appearances at Six Mile Lake this summer.

Though not quite as elusive as a Sasquatch, snowshoe hares can be a rare sight in some years, even in its normal habitat like the U.P.

This member of the lagomorphs — a family that also includes rabbits and the mountain-dwelling pikas, smaller in size and ears — is the only hare that would be expected in the region, though for a time the white-tailed jackrabbit did migrate into Wisconsin after much of the forests were felled in the late 1800s and early 1900s. It’s the same reason sharp-tailed grouse, native to the Great Plains, managed to get a foothold in parts of the U.P. and northern Wisconsin.

But the white-tailed jackrabbit has not been reported in Wisconsin for decades, according to a Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources website.

Snowshoe hares, too, seem to be fading in some parts of what is the southern portion of its range.

The species is known to have 10-year population cycles, not unlike ruffed grouse. These cycles are caused by the hares cranking out large litters when conditions are good, which expands the population until it stresses food resources, causing more mortality and triggering the hares to have fewer young. The hare population then bottoms out, allowing food resources to rebound and send the snowshoes back on the upswing.

But here in the southern edge of snowshoe country, the cycles are less precise than in the conifer-heavy boreal forests of Canada to the north, said Cody Norton, the Michigan Department of Natural Resources’ bear, furbearer and small game specialist. The ground cover is different, as is the mix of predators. Aspen trees, which have bark the hares favor as a winter food source, are more common in the north as well.

Snowshoe hares trying to exist on the southern edge are, too, more at risk of winter snows making an early exit before they’ve begun switching from white to brown, leaving them visible and vulnerable to predators, Norton said.

It’s perhaps why snowshoe hares do seem to be in decline in the northern part of Michigan’s Lower Peninsula, Norton said. Even some parts of the Upper Peninsula have noticed the species becoming more scarce.

But other core areas do seem to maintain robust populations, even in down years, Norton said, adding while their most recent data is no more recent than 2017, he thinks snowshoe hares are trending up in their cycle.

While some of the areas where the snowshoe is slipping have growing numbers of cottontail rabbits, Norton said that’s more likely a change in habitat than the rabbits pushing out the hares.

Cottontail rabbits prefer more settled areas that offer ample food sources, similar to gray squirrels, he said. So as people moved further into the woodlands or converted land to agriculture, the rabbits followed suit, but the two species really don’t directly compete, even where their territories overlap, he said.

The snowshoe hare at Six Mile Lake looks to be younger, though not from this past spring, perhaps a yearling. It appeared in good shape except for the prominent engorged ticks in its ears and on its face.

Despite their numbers, those ticks and the other parasites it likely carries, such as fleas, probably don’t take much out of the hare unless it’s struggling with some other underlying health condition, Norton said.

“For snowshoes, ticks are a normal thing, something they’re adapted to,” he said.

If this hare is fortunate enough to elude the numerous predators — bobcat, wolf, coyote, fox, owls and more — known to be in the area, it was old enough to breed this summer and may live up to five years. Reality is the vast majority of its kind get only a couple chances at most to experience the full change of seasons.

Hope we’ll get to see this one turn white later this year.

Betsy Bloom can be reached at 906-774-2772, ext. 240, or bbloom@ironmountaindailynews.com.