The Jacks are gone...again! Anyone seen any Jack Rabbits?

Mount Sweetness

Mount Sweetness

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Been hunting hard all season for jack rabbits, really hard. Haven't seen a single jack rabbit.....not even any tracks, none. Cottontails seem to be doing just fine. I hunt down in Southern Ontario...Essex County.
I know they go in cycles, but this is stupid. These cycles are extreme, they literally fall off the face of the earth around here for years at a time.
Three years ago I was having a blast, must have saw a few dozen.

Has anyone seen any Jacks this season?
 
I have seen a pair a few times around my ranch. I was also bunny hunting about a week ago and saw lots of jack tracks. They grow cash crops all around me and there are nice tree lines and hedgerows.
 
so far this year all we saw where two jacks in our usual spots, no other sign anywhere. there still are some around but not in the numbers like 3-4 years ago. like the previous post mentioned there are a lot of coyotes, and fox around south western Ontario especially the areas i hunt. seems to me at least 3 times as many coyote tracks as 2 years ago.

another idea would be to push the MNR to close the season earlier like the end of January because they start to breed in February. I had one guy tell me that when he cleaned a jack near the end of February she was already pregnant. Just an idea to try and conserve the hunt. But our regs are made up by some bureaucrats in downtown Toronto who have no idea of whats going on out there.
 
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I thought Jacks were on a come back in south western Ont?

Was thinking of doing a hunt for them last year but didn't have the time.

Coyotes could be the problem in you're area...

Maybe we should all start thinking of shooting them wild dogs on every hunt we go on.

They sure seem to have wrecked the natural order of things around here.:mad:
 
I've been out a few times lately, seen a few cottontail tracks but no Jacks. However the coyotes seem to be doing just fine... Its a cycle thing.
 
Haven't hunted essex county this year yet but I've talked to a few buddies out that way that have done well on jacks. I've jack hunted in Wellington and Elgin County for jacks and have yet to be skunked. We've taken a couple jacks each outting, but we work hard at them. 4 or 5 guys with 2 or 3 beagles to get them. Good luck.
 
I'm in Lambton county and Jacks in the area I hunt are waaay down .
I seen 1(one) set of tracks over the last month .
So...Ive been working on 'yotes which are plentiful and leaving the Jack alone. Hunting 'yotes is quite a challenge.

I also seen a critter that , from a distance and tracks , looked an awful lot like a fisher that has been hanging around the larger brush piles . Tracks lead to one pile then another...Cottontails are getting pushed hard.
 
MagnumPeanut said:
I think there are more rabbits around here than people.

In city limits tho, were they seem to thrive.

And consequently, I can't shoot.
Click to expand...

Same here in Edmontown. Out in the bush, all we see are the odd cottontail. In the city, the jacks are everywhere. So many of them, in fact, that coyotes are hunting them in the river valley and the parks. The yotes even come into suburban neighborhoods looking for them, sometimes.
 
Same in the city limits of Calgary... there are jacks all over the place. I've been on the treadmill at my gym and seen a flock of Hungarian Partridge fly by the wind a few times. Kind of a weird sight to say the least.
 
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