It seems mama’s little baby doesn’t love rabbits after all -- at least not the 40-odd white bunnies abandoned in a Huntington Beach park Sunday.

According to the Huntington Beach Independent, which broke the story yesterday, the fluffy little guys were dumped off at Wieder Regional Park early Sunday morning, whence they hopped away into surrounding areas. The bunny-dumper has yet to be caught or identified.

Nor have the bunnies been caught: The Independent talked to the director of Orange County Animal Care, who said that despite multiple calls, and subsequent visits to the area by animal control officers, not a single rabbit had been recovered.

The bunnies are described as white and probably domesticated, meaning they can’t survive on their own. One Wieder Park neighbor reported seeing a man pull up in a pickup truck early that morning and release the animals from cages, the Independent says.

Could the bunnies have been intended as Easter presents, then discarded post-Easter? The Orange County Register speculates something along those lines, noting that “Bunnies and chicks often make a desirable Easter basket gift but sometimes pet owners later regret their decision.” The same director of OC Animal Care told the Register that pet owners who no longer want their bunnies should drop them off the responsible way -- at a shelter -- or face misdemeanor animal abandonment charges.

(The Register story does not say that this many animals points to a breeder, not a pet owner. Bunnies are famously fertile, but they’re not tribbles.)

Whatever happened, this is not the first bunny-dumping ever reported. Last year, for example, as many as 70 white rabbits were abandoned on a roadside in Colorado.

Anyone with information on the Huntington Beach incident -- or who is able to catch a rabbit -- is asked to call OC Animal Care at (714) 935-6848.