What Rabbits Know That You Don’t About Staying Small In Life

Have you ever wondered why there are no horse-sized rabbits?

Granted, this is not a question that keeps most people up at night, but there’s gold in the answer. Lemme explain. Rabbits, hares and pikas (lagomorphs) don’t vary much in size, growing to a max of 11lbs in the wild. Compare that to rodents, which range from the pygmy mouse at a fraction of an ounce to the scale-bending capybara at 110 lbs.

If rodents can be supersized, why not rabbits?

Because of the presence of ungulates. Say what? Animals with hooves. Rabbits may reproduce like, well, bunnies, but beyond 14 lbs they are not as energy efficient as ungulates. The fossil record shows that whatever hoofed animal lived in its neighborhood determined the size of the lagomorph. The bigger the beast, the smaller the rabbit/hare/pika. 

But that’s more science than I signed up for! you whine.  Be patient, grasshopper. Here’s the point:

Betcha you have stayed up at night sometimes, wondering why you keep yourself small.  Is it possible that it has nothing to do with your past, your character flaws or whatever else you are berating yourself for? 

Could it be that there are large hoofed beasts in your life eating so much of your lunch that you can’t thrive?

It’s so easy to blame only ourselves for our smallness. For sure, we have sole responsibility for our lives, and we need to own our stuff. But we also need to know what people or what systems in our environment keep us in check, just because they’re there. What are the ways in which our growth is limited by them? 

Stop letting them eat your lunch and there’ll be no stopping you!

Photo credit: Illustration: “attack of the giant rabbit…” by Franckie is licensed under CC BY-NC-SA 2.0

Niels, David. “Why Are There No Horse-sized Rabbits? We Finally Know The Evolutionary Answer” Sciencealert.com, 24 April 2021