According to him, tolai hares do not exceed 50 cm in length and can weigh up to 2 kg. However, they are perfectly adapted to life in challenging environments, such as dry deserts and high mountains, where other animals cannot survive. The tolai hare once inhabited almost everywhere in Kyrgyzstan, making it difficult to find a corner free from its presence.
“Speaking of complete similarity, Kyrgyz people use the proverb ‘koendoy okshosh’ — ‘similar as hares.’ This saying likely arose among a people who frequently encountered hares. Wherever a person went, a hare could appear at any moment, so often that it was impossible to distinguish whether they had met the same hare or another. The tolai hare is capable of enduring many hardships, but poaching becomes fatal for it. It deprives sports hunters of the joy of successful trophies,” he said.
Hunter-sportsman Denis Grebenev shared insights on hunting hares.
“Despite their fear, hares rarely run far away. Usually, they make a circle and return back. This habit is the basis for hunting with taigans. The hunter waits at the spot where the hare was scared and sends the dog on its trail. The dog chases the hare, and it jumps out again at the hunter. However, often tolai hares do not even make a small circle but simply run away and hide. You can track their escape by following their footprints. Hare tracks are easy to recognize: on snow or wet sand, they leave characteristic marks — long prints of their hind legs and fat dots from their front paws,” he noted.
In Kyrgyzstan, hunting for hares is permitted from October 5, 2019, to January 26, 2020. The standard catch limit is 3 hares per day, and up to 20 can be caught in a season.
The stereotype of the hare's cowardice is not true. One of the gamekeepers of the Kalinin Interdistrict Society of Hunters and Fishermen witnessed an astonishing battle.
“I was sitting in the mountains at the edge of a sunny glade in the Min-Tokum gorge (the Kara-Balta region). At that time, a hare was hopping around the glade. Suddenly, a kite (a predatory bird of the hawk family) attacked it from above. However, the hare did not run away but instead engaged in battle. Upon seeing the kite, it curled up, jumped, and began to strike the predator with its front paws. No matter how much the kite tried to catch the hare, it could not succeed. In the end, when the kite attacked again, the hare struck it with such force that it fell to the side like a stone and quickly flew away. The hare sat for a while longer and then disappeared into the bushes,” the gamekeeper recounted.
