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Ancestor: Banded Rabbits

Size: Tallest species is  90 cm to the top of it's head, 111 cm when including the ears. The shortest species is 45 cm to the top of it's head, 64 cm when including the ears.

Dietary Needs: Mixed herbivorous diet of grass, herbs, shrub leaves, fruit, roots and tuber-like growths. Can use it's feet to uproot shallow roots from loose soil. Food is heavily masticated by the molars and undergoes minimal stomach digestion. It is fermented in the intestines where some nutrients are absorbed. It is then passed into the caecum where it undergoes a different fermentation process to release more nutrients. This all produces a lot of gas, which the animal expels a lot of. The caecum is blood enriched to carry absorbed nutrients away from the organ, much more so than it's ancestors. This lessens the need of ingestion of caecal pellets, but they still rarely engage in this behaviour, especially when sick they consume pellets of healthy individuals.

Becoming sick causes too much gas, which can cause intestinal twisting, which can block and even kill the intestine. It is therefore important for the animal to self-medicate to lessen the chance of this occurring. As well as caecal pellets of healthy individuals, they also instinctively consume charcoal if it is available (natural fires are common) when a particular food causes stomach irritation, as it may have been a plant toxin that the charcoal can absorb for excretion. They also learn from their mothers which medicinal plants to eat under which circumstances by observation and mimicry.

Life Cycle: Males compete for females through rearing up tall on their hind legs to measure each other. If this doesn't settle the dispute they slap or rake each other with their forepaws. Because tensions run high between rival males these structured contests can devolve into rough-and-tumble scraps with flying fur and blood.

Males grow larger and heavier than females and many species have differences in markings to distinguish them. Males often develop darker, smokier markings  on the face and back than the females, and in many species develop  a black shadowy smudge from the face all the way down their spine to the tail. Males can escape the pursuit of cats but are less likely than a female to do so. However, they are also more likely to be able to fight off a cat than a female, and the heavier, stronger males are more likely to mate than lighter males by a significant margin.

Does often become pregnant in the dry season and give birth in the wet season. They usually have no more than two offspring at a time, sometimes only one. Their young are born more developed than their ancestor's as they must be able to flee cats soon as possible, which is within a few days of birth. They don't dig deep burrows, more of a shelter that protects from the weather but not from cats. Here the babies lie motionless and odourless waiting for their mother to return and feed them. The milk intake within the first few days is crucial. They grow so fast at this time that without enough milk, they might end up lame for life.

Once they are running around they follow their mother with her herd (if she has one) for several months learning from her how to survive, gradually moving from milk to soft greens and fruits.  They're usually mature within 7 to 9 months, but males will take longer than females to find mates due to being more competitive. Dominant males usually take all the nearby reproductively active females.

Other: They make a shrill high-pitched scream when they see a cat, which alerts the rest of the herd to flee.

Species:

• Striped Leploft is a species found in open grassy areas with patches of seasonal wetland where newly evolved bloodsucking gnats spend their larval stage. There is more info under the image at the top of this page.