Rabbit Story- 3: The Coyote and the Return Home

Quietly, she crept under a bush. Wrinkling her nose, the mother cottontail realized she was crouching next to a half dead sparrow. The coyote was sniffing the hedge where her kits were hidden. The mother rabbit tensed, rustling the bush. She was relieved when she saw the coyote turn away. Until the cottontail noticed that he was looking right at her...

The mother rabbit watched the coyote get closer...and closer...and closer. She waited until the last second before she zipped away. The cottontail raced around the cattails, over the bridge, and into the tool shed. She tried to hide when she realized she couldn't get out from the back, but it was no use. The coyote had seen her enter the tool shed. As he approached, the mother cottontail noticed that the coyote was limping. When the coyote got as close as he could, the cottontail shot through his legs, around a buckeye tree, and onto the frozen pond. She waited, daring him to join her. He took a tentative step onto the the ice. The mother cottontail watched as the coyote take one step... then another...then another...then...WHAM! The coyote slipped and fell. Startled, the cottontail rabbit shot over the ice, bounced twice on the coyote's back, and zigzagged back to her burrow. Angered, the coyote sniffed the ground, trying to find the rabbit's scent. Fortunately, he followed the wrong scent trail and ended up under the bush with the half dead sparrow. Disappointed, the coyote took the sparrow in his mouth and slunk out of the Outdoor Learning Lab.

It wasn't until then was the mother cottontail rabbit feeling safe enough to leave the mouth of her burrow and curl up with her babies to go to sleep. A day full of dangers over. At last.