Is this the mythical 'jackelope'? Bunny filmed hopping around Minnesota yard with rare infection that makes rabbits grow horns
Frankenstein has the rare Shope papilloma virus
The virus causes horn-like tumours to grow on rabbits' heads
The diseased rabbit was last seen in the Boettcher family's backyard in Minnesota five days ago
A video of a rabbit with a rare disease that causes gruesome-looking growths to protrude from its head has attracted over 200,000 views online in less than a week.
Dubbed ‘Frankenstein', the animal was first seen by the Boettcher family in Mankato, Minnesota, early last month, hopping around in their backyard.
The rabbit is infected by the cottontail papilloma virus (CRPV), also known as Shope papilloma virus, which causes tumours to grow on or near the animal's head.
The tumours can eventually become large enough to interfere with the rabbit's ability to eat, causing them to die of starvation.
Frankenstein: The rabbit has a disease that causes tumours to grow from his head
Monster rabbit: Frankenstein hides under the Boettcher family's truck in their backyard in Minnesota
The horn-like tumours growing from Frankenstein's head will eventually get so big that he will die from starvation
Gunnar Boettcher, 20, who studies Exercise Science and Studio Art at Gustavus Adolphus College, St Peter, Minnesota, tells the Mail Online he thinks the rabbit lives in their shed or wood pile.
‘Whenever we got close, he always ran away. We could never get a close look at him,’ says Gunnar.
The college student finally got close enough to take the first pictures and video of Frankenstein last week.
He and his younger brother, Zander, 15, made a ‘funny documentary' on the rabbit as it hopped through their garden.
In the video, Gunnar tells the viewers he has seen a 'monster rabbit'.
'It’s crazy, it’s got monster spikes sticking out of his head, we don’t know what this thing is capable of,' he says as the video zooms in on the rabbit.
Gunnar Boettcher, 20, tells viewers he is about to approach the 'monster rabbit' he has named Frankenstein
They uploaded the video to Facebook which spread like wildfire and has become ‘extremely popular’, according to Gunnar.
He says his friend Shane decided to put the photos of the rabbit on Reddit.com, titled ‘Rabbit living in my friend's backyard’.
The video has garnered 1,950 comments and 223,592 views after just five days online.
Rabbits who contract the virus have often been the source of stories about the mythical 'jackalope', which is a rabbit with the antlers of an antelope.
Storiesand illustrations of horned rabbits have appeared in scientific books dating back many years, such as the Tableau encyclopédique et méthodiquefrom 1789.
Myth: The jackalope, a rabbit with the antlers of an antelope, is a mythical creature inspired by rabbits with the disease
The Shope papillomavirus, which provided the first mammalian model of a cancer caused by a virus, takes its name from Dr Richard E. Shope, who discovered it in the 1930s.
His research has been very beneficial to humans and has been used as a model for human papillomaviruses, such as the HPV vaccine, which was developed based on and incorporating research done using the virus as a model.
It has also been used to investigate antiviral therapies.
