Wascally wabbits

Little Peter Cottontail is hopping down the bunny trail, right into gun sights of the rich and famous.

Hunters are permitted to kill rabbits if they eat crops, but cottontails munch expensive shrubbery at golf courses and yards in gated communities in the Palm Springs area. That prompted Assemblyman John Benoit (R-Palm Desert) to sponsor a bill to broaden bunny hunting, but animal rights groups killed it in the Senate in June.

“God knows how much those snobs paid for their houses. They can afford to put in landscaping that rabbits won’t eat,” says Virginia Handley of the Fund for Animals.

In the end, state Atty. Gen. Bill Lockyer hopped into action and reinterpreted existing law to allow for the killing of rabbits that eat decorative plants. As summer sizzles, hungry bunnies tread upon manicured lawns in the Coachella Valley at their own peril.

-- Charles Duhigg