Rabbits: adorable, fluffy, prone to dying. Seriously, these little guys can have actual heart attacks at the sound of a balloon popping.

But that still doesn't explain the mass rabbit deaths in South St. Louis's Villanova neighborhood. The subdivision "normally teeming with rabbits" suddenly became rabbit-free three weeks ago.

Now residents are finding little bunny corpses — but the animals don't appear injured.

I'll let longtime Villanova resident Joe Dobbs break it down for you.

I've lived here about sixteen years. Never seen anything like this. Usually see rabbits all over the neighborhood and now, for some reason, they're just showing up dead.

Dobbs found eight dead rabbits in his backyard, which is both weird and potentially traumatic.

So what gives? Residents fear West Nile virus, because that's a common thing to freak out about, but Missouri's Department of Natural Resources doesn't think that's the culprit.

The real answer might be tampered feed: a local resident who used to leave seed out for area animals stopped after being concerned that someone had messed with his supply. But who would poison rabbit food? And if the animal-loving resident had stopped leaving food out, how did the rabbits get poisoned?

Also: aliens?

[Image via Shutterstock]