{"id":304519,"date":"2025-11-24T21:17:08","date_gmt":"2025-11-24T21:17:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/304519\/"},"modified":"2025-11-24T21:17:08","modified_gmt":"2025-11-24T21:17:08","slug":"calgary-jackrabbits-have-a-unique-health-issue-and-experts-are-puzzled","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/304519\/","title":{"rendered":"Calgary jackrabbits have a unique health issue and experts are puzzled"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>If you spend enough <a href=\"https:\/\/dailyhive.com\/calgary\/calgary-best-places-to-live-2025\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">time in Calgary<\/a>, you\u2019re bound to see one of the many jackrabbits that skirt around the city, and new research has revealed that some have a unique health anomaly.<\/p>\n<p>In a recent study examining 130 jackrabbits found near city roadways, Dr. Jamie Rothenburger, wildlife veterinary pathologist and assistant professor in the Faculty of Veterinary Medicine (UCVM) at the University of Calgary (U of C), identified renal hamartomas \u2014 benign, tumour-like kidney growths \u2014 in six percent of the animals.<\/p>\n<p>Renal hamartomas are rare lesions composed of normal tissue elements arranged abnormally. The U of C research added that while typically harmless, this frequency and concentration have not been documented in any previous large-scale studies of wild hares or rabbits worldwide.<\/p>\n<p><img alt=\"\" title=\"\" loading=\"lazy\" width=\"2048\" height=\"1365\" decoding=\"async\" data-nimg=\"1\" class=\"size-full wp-image-2217787\" style=\"color:transparent\"   src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/Shutterstock_1755372434.jpg\"\/><\/p>\n<p id=\"caption-attachment-2217787\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">mmckinneyphotography\/Shutterstock<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThis represents a unique temporal and geographical cluster. We don\u2019t yet know what\u2019s contributing to these findings, but they raise important questions about how urban environments influence wildlife health,\u201d said Dr. Jamie Rothenburger, wildlife veterinary pathologist and assistant professor at UCVM, in a news release.<\/p>\n<p>The study forms part of a larger project exploring health and disease in Calgary\u2019s wild hares. Future research will investigate causes of death among jackrabbits, as well as their parasites and bacteria, to better understand how urban factors may be influencing disease and survival.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThis type of research helps us understand the connection between urbanization, animal health, and our shared environments,\u201d said Rothenburger. \u201cWildlife in cities like Calgary offer valuable clues about how development and environmental change impact all species \u2014 including humans.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The finding regarding jackrabbits in Calgary is one of the many studies the\u00a0University of Calgary Faculty of Veterinary Medicine is undertaking to try to understand and protect the health of animals and ecosystems across Alberta\u2019s rapidly developing urban landscapes.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"If you spend enough time in Calgary, you\u2019re bound to see one of the many jackrabbits that skirt&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":304520,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[26],"tags":[49,48,66,323],"class_list":{"0":"post-304519","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-wildlife","8":"tag-ca","9":"tag-canada","10":"tag-science","11":"tag-wildlife"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/304519","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=304519"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/304519\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/304520"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=304519"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=304519"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=304519"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}