Snowshoe hares live in forested area and willow thickets. These long eared animals can grow to over a foot and a half tall with large snowshoe feet padded with thick hair allowing the hare to travel easily over areas of deep snow.

Because the snowshoe hare is hunted by almost every mammalian predator of the north it has developed a special camouflage. Twice each year they change color. Their winter coat is white and they turn a dark brown in summer. This enables them to "melt" into the background and when they remain perfectly still they are difficult to detect.

This is an animal who's population fluctuates over the years. The cycle ranges from eight to eleven years. Over a period of about two years their numbers swell to an extremely large population and then toward the end of the cycle the numbers crash. The timing of the rise and fall of numbers occurs at the same time throughout Alaska and the Canadian Yukon. The rise and fall of predators such as the lynx coincide with those of the hare.

Their powerful legs can cover 3 feet in a single bound and when disturbed they run and leap a zig zag pattern in a desperate attempt to evade predators.

The hares excrete soft green pellets of partly digested food and then eat them so that all nutrients are fully extracted before excreting hard, dry, fully digested pellets.

They eat white spruce needles, dwarf birch, and willow twigs. Many other tender buds and twigs of various plants provide food during summer and winter.

Snowshoe hares have up to four litters between May and September. The male doesn't care for the young at all and the female visits the young once a day to feed the young leverets. She stays only a few minutes to allow them to suckle Each day the leverets separate and bed down alone in separate spots to avoid detection and then gather at a central spot for feeding by their mother. These tactics make detection by predators more difficult.