Eastern cottontails appear in 452 South Dakota records spread across more than 40 counties, but the weight of the record sits east of the Missouri. Brookings and Minnehaha counties lead by a wide margin, and named sites like Farm Island and the parks along the Missouri National Recreational River reflect the species’ taste for riverbottom brush and settled edges.
An edge specialist
This is a rabbit of thickets, shelterbelts, field borders, gardens, and overgrown fencelines, never far from dense cover it can dive into. The rusty patch on the nape and its shorter ears help separate it from the paler desert cottontail that replaces it in the state’s dry western quarter. Where the two approach each other, the eastern animal holds the brushier, wetter ground.
Breeding through the warm months
A female eastern cottontail raises several litters between spring and late summer, each in a shallow, grass-lined nest scratched into open ground. South Dakota’s records climb from April to a June peak as young rabbits leave the nest and long evenings put more animals in view. Cottontails neither hibernate nor hole up for long; they keep feeding through the snow months on bark, buds, and twigs.
Status in South Dakota
NatureServe ranks the eastern cottontail S5, Secure, in South Dakota, and the species is native to the state. USGS NAS does not list it as nonindigenous here.
Full species profile
