It’s not just a bad hare day.

A rapidly spreading virus is causing cottontail rabbits to grow black, tentacle-like growths out of their heads, prompting warnings to steer clear of the mutated animals.

The so-called Frankenbunnies have been spotted multiple times in Fort Collins, Colorado. Resident Susan Mansfield told 9News she saw a rabbit with what looked like “black quills or black toothpicks sticking out all around his or her mouth.” 4

4

“I thought he would die off during the winter, but he didn’t,” she said. “He came back a second year, and it grew.”

One person described the infected critter as having “a scabbiesh-looking growth over their face.”

The so-called bunny blight is actually a disease called cottontail papilloma virus (CRPV), also known as Shope papilloma virus,

See Full Page