Snowshoe hares are built for cold, snowy country, with big furred feet and a coat that turns white each winter for camouflage. New Mexico sits at the very southern tip of a range that stretches north through the Rockies all the way to Alaska, so the high conifer forest around Carson National Forest, Rio Chama, and El Vado Lake State Park represents a small, isolated edge population rather than the species’ core range.
That edge status shows up directly in the numbers. New Mexico ranks the species S2, Imperiled, even though it’s secure across its much larger northern range.
Of 12 total records, the heaviest counts fall in July and August, with a smaller rise in the fall. Snowshoe hares don’t change their basic habits by season in a way that would explain that swing, so warmer months with more hikers in the mountains are the more likely explanation.
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