Magellan And Parsley

 Here on the Island there have pretty much always been rabbits.

A long time ago somebody brought in European hares and that variety must have liked it here because when we got here twelve years ago there were lots of them.

By then some later arriving domestic rabbits had escaped so the population had become more of a mélange.

In our time here the overall population grew at a noticeable rate - not an explosion, but a steady increase.

Then a few years back, we heard that on the next island over a hemorrhagic virus was wasting that island's rabbits.

It took a couple years, but the virus found its way to our population and frighteningly soon all our rabbit friends disappeared.

So, when after a couple of years of no rabbits a tiny pair of them appeared in early mornings in the gravel and moss adjacent to a large stand of ground hugging juniper in front of our house, we were overjoyed.

The rabbits were back.

These tiny guys were identical except one was black and one was brindle.

I could watch them for hours as they ran around, stopped to eat whatever it was that was edible where they stopped and had endless faux fights and baby rabbit boxing matches.

That was early last year.

In the interim they have both grown into adults with the black one being more rangy - like a jack rabbit - and the brindle one looking like a typical hare.

In spite of the differences, they must be siblings.

And they both still like to hang out together most of the time.

One of our neighbors named the black one Magellan because he is always travelling somewhere.

We have named the brindle one Parsley because he really likes parsley.

We don't really know if they are he or she.

Yesterday we found both of them dead and partially eaten immediately adjacent to their juniper covered home.

We will be forever sad.