Consistently low numbers of rabbits this year

[Flacko 1,744]

Doh think many rabbits round Weston no more Ray,reckon the way the farming is done a helping and if the humble rabbit is a gauge of our countryside it’s in shit order 

[Daniel cain 45,400]

6 hours ago, comanche said:

My belief ,based on a little bit of inside information is that the massive rabbit numbers of about 13 years ago crashed  due to the cold winter of 2010/11 combined with a sowing of a certain strain of VHD.

And due to the very short lived immunity to the disease that is conferred on the survivors of the disease and their offspring ,   young rabbits  are lucky to live long enough to produce a single litter before expiring. 

Hence the population in affected areas isn't  strong enough to negate the effects of other diseases ,hunting, predators and bad weather.  

An old keeper up near the Advie Estate told Us something very similar in 2015 when we were there ...said that cold spell all but wiped them out at the time? Based on previous trips he was on the money

[FOXHUNTER 5,021]

It wouldn't have been the cold but disease. We used to get much worse winters than that and rabbits survived, they cant beat RHD. 

[Blackmag 6,090]

Not a lot rabbit wise near me now I could run twice as many roe as rabbits  I see more foxes round student areas than the countryside I can light up double figures on a council estate yet barely a couple out in the sticks sign of the times 

[Aled 482]

Been poor numbers around my part of West Wales for years, however i have seen more this year than for many years. Plan to go ferreting with a pal to harvest a few locally this month, 1st time i've seen enough to do that for many years!!

[FOXHUNTER 5,021]

Rabbits are just like any other quarry , you have them or you dont.

My permissions range from high populations to zero.

Same with foxes , never been many up North yet go down South and tripping over them.

 

 

[FOXHUNTER 5,021]

Get a few coloured ones now and again..

[Blackmag 6,090]

On 28/12/2023 at 17:05, The one said:

Due to the wet weather closing the golf course across the road  i have  been walking the dogs there , for the first time in two years i have been on there  . I was paid to control the rabbits there used to get a few hundred a year i was surprised they have let the brambles go you cant see a warren in the rough now  but the lurchers never marked a single spot on the whole course 

Unless ferreting I didn't bother with golf places greasy surfaces more risk than reward for a rabbit and gear like shite of a shovel ect 

[FOXHUNTER 5,021]

Long time since I've done golf courses but taken plenty off them over the years.

[comanche 2,999]

12 hours ago, FOXHUNTER said:

It wouldn't have been the cold but disease. We used to get much worse winters than that and rabbits survived, they cant beat RHD. 

Very true..rabbits can stand very  cold  weather as long they have food.

They don't  do well in lengthy cold wet conditions.  The stress of  constant chills and discomfort triggers a weakened immunity to coccidiosis  and  other diseases. 

By the winter of 2010/11 I had been lucky to have spent several Seasons ferreting by kind invitation of another Hunting Life member on some  very good permission . 

That winter we had ferrets lay-up on skinny frozen corpses .

It was a similar story in my own area.  Back when dinosaurs ruled the Earth and  l first  started ferreting   locally , a couple of rabbits was a big bag. They weren't  very common , though the number of big ,deep but vacant burrows indicated that things must've  been different in the past.       Slowly rabbit numbers built-up until by the end of the first decade of the 2000s they were nearing plague numbers!

What a great time for "someone"  to field trial a few new strains of "something ".

And by chance the following winter is really bad one .....job done 

Probably more thoroughly than anyone  expected.

 

 

 

 

 

Edited January 1 by comanche

[FOXHUNTER 5,021]

I agree a long cold wet winter will have many fatalities but nothing like RHD.

I too have found many emaciated rabbits that are skin and bone in a bad winter but come the Spring/ Summer there numbers are back , this never happened with RHD. On ground where there was thousands it literally killed them all off over night.

Thankfully now I am seeing numbers of rabbits emerging where there were none.

[comanche 2,999]

1 hour ago, FOXHUNTER said:

I agree a long cold wet winter will have many fatalities but nothing like RHD.

I too have found many emaciated rabbits that are skin and bone in a bad winter but come the Spring/ Summer there numbers are back , this never happened with RHD. On ground where there was thousands it literally killed them all off over night.

Thankfully now I am seeing numbers of rabbits emerging where there were none.

I remember when l was a Keeper we were told to look out for dead rabbits in odd circumstances.

Sure enough we found a few corpses that caught the attention as being a bit odd ;unmarked  rabbits leaning against logs, some on their sides, others sitting like they were still alive !    Without much thought the unexplained deaths were casually reported to the Boss and we got on with our work.   

This was just prior to the initial recognition of VHD , the "first" version . Though l think we called it  Viral hemorrhagic pneumonia  at the time.  

There were all sorts of theories and spin-stories  as to its origin.  Unsurprisingly fingers poked toward the import of frozen Chinese rabbit . Realistically the jump from pre packed rabbit to infesting the British Countryside  seems a bit tenuous . Especially as the disease was already known in European laboratories and the humble bunny is a favourite lab animal.....and at the time there were also a lot more Continental fur farms.

Anyway the early epidemic didn't  do any lasting damage.

 I'm totally  with you on the later  version/s  FOXHUNTER .

It/ they seem to be much more efficient . Rabbits just "stop being there. "   

My present ferrets have never seen a live rabbit . Over the last few years when a few bunnies have shown up l have shot the odd one  on my permission  but usually l just wave and wish them well . 

 But they don't  seem to make any progress and just fade away .

Fingers crossed for your population growth FH

[Black neck 15,950]

This wet weather is deffo fecking them flooding the warrens out leaving um soaked shivering in what cover is left its not good I tell thee

[Whoknows 163]

As I said before, it’s disease, and pressure on remaining pockets from improved tech, predation, and occasional wank weather. The warm winters are lethal in terms of continued disease and gastric intestinal pressure issues. 
 

A lot of the countryside is actually more suitable to rabbits now then it has been previously  

[FUJI 17,304]

On 27/12/2023 at 23:44, OldPhil said:

One thing rabbits just cannot handle, is the wet AND the cold,...combined......

They can take one or the other,...but continuous soaking, day in, day out,...never being able to get dry and warm,.. weakens them terribly....

 

Living where I do where we get over 250 day's a year of rain I can well believe this,rabbits are & always have been thin on the ground in the area I live,if you don't or won't travel then you needn't have a running dog nor a ferret.