Officials from Indonesia's Kerinci Seblat National Park saved a Sumatran striped rabbit, a critically endangered species, after seeing it on Facebook.
Sumatran striped rabbits are rarely seen worldwide, Phys.org said. The species is commonly regarded to be the world's rarest rabbit, with just a dozen Dutch museum specimens obtained in the early twentieth century, as well as an infrequent glimpse in the wild and a handful of camera trap photos.
Finding one in a Tasmanian pet store is the Indonesian equivalent of spotting one on Facebook. The conservation community was eager to react. Hence, park officials and Fauna & Flora International (FFI), a non-profit conservation group, collaborated to find and retrieve the bunny.
A Local Farmer "Opportunistically" Got the Rabbit, FFI Says
A local farmer opportunistically grabbed the rabbit near the national park boundary, adjacent to a flooded river, FFI claimed. The rabbit suffered a minor lesion to its flank, which the group believes was inflicted during the flash flood. The park rangers have now safely released the rabbit back into an undisclosed forest with existing video trap data.
Despite the rabbits' reputation for being prolific breeders, this species is usually the world's rarest. Scientists' information is based on a few camera trap photos and several samples in Dutch museums gathered almost a century ago during the colonial period.
Deborah Martyr of FFI, who works with park officials, said in a CNA report that nobody is familiar with this species except that it prefers mossy slope and submontane woodland. After the farmer who took the rabbit realized how rare it was, Martyr claimed that he was delighted to see it restored to the national park.
Rare Rabbit's Vital Retreat
Daily Mail said that the Annamite striped rabbit, which lives in the highlands near the Laos-Vietnam borderline and is declared endangered, is the closest known species to the rabbit.
On the other hand, the Sumatran striped rabbit is thought to reside in the Barisan highlands of western Sumatra.
A Sumatran striped rabbit was spotted in the wild for the first time in 1997. The rabbit is classified as Data Deficient on the IUCN Red List.
A study titled "Observation of Sumatran Striped Rabbit (Nesolagus Netscheri) in the Wild" verified that a rabbit was seen 15 kilometers northeast of Krui, Sumatra, in June 2009.
As it was seen by a motorist at night, this rabbit was less than 40 centimeters (15.8in) in length, with gray hair and its distinctive black stripes, as well as orange eyeshine. However, the encounter was too fleeting for a photograph.
The Sumatran striped rabbit was initially discovered in 1972, although it was not documented until 2000, close to the Laos-Vietnam border.
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