HARE: arriving unannounced by crashing through a hedge

BIG, sleek and fast, the hare is an impressive native of the countryside, though a creature which is spotted less and less as its normal habitats vanish under the property developer's bulldozer.

The destruction of much of our countryside has sounded the death knell for many ancient hare communities with the wide open spaces necessary for their survival gradually disappearing.

Anyone who has ever watched a hare going at full pelt across a field cannot fail to be impressed by the sight.

Much bigger and more athletic than the rabbit, the brown hare is usually a match for any pursuing fox or bird of prey with ambitions to feast on its tasty, high-speed flesh.

Baby hares - or leverets - are, of course, a different matter and many are taken by predators despite their inborn skill of lying motionless for hours on end in the centre of a windswept field.

Two or three leverets are born in each litter and, like their parents, must learn to survive the ferocious winds, rain, and freezing temperatures that blast the open fields.

Such conditions normally put other creatures to flight but a hare will stoically huddle down to see out the worst of the weather in the barest of cover.

Hares can clock up an impressive 35mph when they are disturbed or when vying with fellow hares for dominance during their annual Mad March period.

At this time of year, it is possible to watch male hares standing up on their hind legs 'boxing' with a fellow male or being 'boxed' back in return by a female - called a Jill - brushing off unwelcome advances.

In between these bouts of frenetic pawing, hares will streak around a field at a dizzying rate of knots, seemingly oblivious to onlookers.

I remember one day stopping my car in an anonymous country lane to check the engine and being diverted by the crazy activities of some hares in a nearby field.

I must have watched them for half an hour, marvelling at their sheer turn of speed and impressive jinking runs as they tried to shrug each other off. Another time, I was enjoying a quiet country walk when I was startled by a huge Jack hare which came crashing unannounced through the hedgerow to my left.

Grey-brown with orangey tufts of hair on his underside, he clattered to a halt in a ditch beside the footpath where I was walking.

For a couple of seconds, he lay there stunned, his enormous marble-like eyes staring straight at me.

Compared with a rabbit, the hare seems a much wilder, tougher creature altogether and the look in those eyes was uncompromising, almost fearless. However, something seemed to have put him to flight.

It was possible that he had just shaken off a fox or perhaps another Jack hare, even bigger than himself, had got the better of him.

Whatever, in a moment, he was back on his feet and sprang across the path like a gazelle, disappearing into another hedgerow on my right and powering across the next field until he was out of sight.

For such a relatively large animal, the camouflage skills of the hare are also quite impressive.

Resting up in the middle of a field, a hare lies close to the ground with his big ears flat against his body.

From a distance, he appears like a small mound of earth and will often not move until anyone trudging by is within just a few feet.

A rambler who walks in remote countryside, particularly someone who prefers open spaces to densely wooded areas, will probably put up a hare at some time.

It is usually a shock to see that small explosion of fur near your feet, a sensation generally replaced by admiration as the hare gracefully bounds away to find some peace and quiet elsewhere.