$20,000 garden destroyed as rabbit plague sweeps Bass Coast

Maureen and Harold Jackson used to have a green plot their neighbour said was worthy of a Gardening Australia episode - but then came the rabbits.

The Jacksons have lived in Cowes for the last 40 years, and Harold told the Gippsland Monitor this was “by far the worst year for rabbits we’ve ever seen”.

Harold estimated the cost of the damage to his property at between $15,000 and $20,000. He’s tried everything from baiting to filling the warrens, but nothing seems to slow the influx of rabbits.

“There's holes everywhere. They just keep eating everything, destroying a lot of trees, digging up the roots and damaging the fenceline.”

Bass Coast Councillor Ron Bauer told the Monitor that the rabbit situation was among the topics most regularly raised by locals.

Eradication plan needed

At the Bass Coast Shire council meeting last Tuesday, Bauer brought a motion to have  council staff provide a report on possible eradication and population control options regarding rabbits, feral cats and deer.

“They are everywhere, the rabbits are borrowing under people’s homes, they’re digging up everybody’s gardens,” he said. “The damage they’re doing to native flora is horrendous.”

Councillor Tim O’Brien said it was not unusual to “walk out into your garden and see that $200-$300 worth of plants that you put in the day before are all gone, thanks to rabbits”.

Bauer acknowledged the problem was complex, and that measures such as baiting can  impact native wildlife.

The council voted unanimously in favour of the motion.

Why are there so many rabbits?

Bass Coast Landcare Network Invasive Species Coordinator Aaron Stephens told the Monitor that “rabbits can breed year round if there's enough green grass”.

Stephens said grass is a rabbits natural food source so the population normally declines during summer when grasses die off completely.

Unfortunately for those who take pride in their garden, Phillip Island is “one of these spots where it tends to be green year round; the rabbits are perfectly fine to continue breeding”.

He said the Bass Coast rabbit population “has been strong for about the last three to four years”.

Destroy the warren

Stephen told the Monitor property owners should first seek to bring rabbit numbers down by using a combination of baiting, shooting or fumigation (depending on the size of the property). 

Once the rabbits have been culled, the warren must be demolished. This can be done by hand with a shovel or using a tractor or bulldozer. Stephens said if rabbits are killed but the warren is left intact, “more rabbits will come eventually, and they can just move in and start breeding straight away”.

Stephens recommends looking “under houses, under structures, under any timber or stuff that's been left where rabbits can get underneath and construct a warren. Rabbits really struggle to breed without one so by finding the warren and destroying it, you're going a big step in the right direction.”