I Bet This Doesn't Work Either

To arms Thumper! Flopsy and Cottontail break out the ninja gear. Bunnies are under attack. The authorities in Sydney have declared war. Actually Australia has been in a state of low grade war with rabbits since the damn animals were introduced back in 1859. Some idiot grew nostalgic for rabbit hunting back in the old country and got a relative to send him a bunch which he then released into the wild. He succeeded beyond his wildest dreams. Pretty soon their were more rabbits than farmers had bullets for their guns.

Shamefully Australia resorted to biological warfare releasing first myxamatosis and later the more modern calicivirus but although the rabbit population has taken some severe knocks they don't look like becoming extinct any time soon. When you look at all the animals the human race has made extinct and then look at the profusion of rabbits, possibly the most gormlessly cute animal on earth, it makes you realise that the other animals just weren't really trying. If an animal the size and texture of a novelty slipper can survive everything that human ingenuity can throw at it I think there should be some embarrassed looks in the extinct species club.

But back to the current intifada being waged by the City of Sydney. Sydney has a "wild" rabbit population. The inverted commas are used because I find it difficult to describe cute little bunny rabbits as wild. Rabbits look as though they evolved specifically to be pets for the soppier sort of human and it probably surprises them greatly when certain humans do the biological equivalent of pouring acid into their lungs. Nevertheless wild these rabbits are, they hang around under the southern pylons of the Sydney Harbour Bridge where there are a couple of modest parks for them to frolic in. I know, I've seen them. At first I thought some kid had lost a pet but then I saw another and another.

Now it seems their welcome is up. Apparently in the rather conducive climate of Sydney the rabbits have been breeding like... what's the word I'm looking for here? The end result is apparently an overpopulation of rabbits. Fortunately for the locals (some of whom have been sneaking out and feeding the fast breeding little beggars) the local council doesn't actually plan to kill them. Well not all of them, apparently it plans to trap them, euthanise those that are diseased and distribute the others to citizens who have always wanted a rabbit for a pet. A perfectly humane solution which I am sure will be a hundred percent unsuccessful. The reason why we have a wild rabbit colony in Sydney in the first place is because of escapes from the homes of careless pet owners. I give it a year before the bunnies are back on their old stamping ground and more power to them.

I am well aware (because I just read the newspaper article) that rabbits cause lots of damage to various structures. Apparently they undermine foundations but frankly unless the bridge itself is about to collapse into the harbour under relentless bunny assault I'm sure we can deal with the problems. Animals frolicing in the city make people happy. Well some animals frolicing in the city make people happy. I doubt if much fuss would be raised if the council decided to wipe out Sydney's rat or pigeon population but some animals make us feel a little better about living in the city. I think their presence reassures us that animals can survive our presence after all and we needn't feel so bad about bulldozing that wetland to make way for a nuclear waste dump. A former girlfriend of mine and I spent an entire Sunday afternoon dashing from one vet to another in a desperate attempt to find one that was open and could save the life of the baby possum we found underneath our clothesline. Neither of us is what you might call environmentally active.

Still the bunnies have survived guns, traps, foxes (introduced by some other idiot who wanted something hunt. What the hell was wrong with kangaroos?) and specially engineered diseases. Somehow I don't think a council eviction order is going to have them quaking in their fur.

At some point we probably are going to have to wipe out all the bunnies on earth. It's just getting too embarrassing. We are the species that bestrides this earth like a colossus. Species without number have fallen before our withering gaze. Proud carnivores, stately trees, idiotic looking birds all have been crushed by our bloody hand and yet what is this frolicing about our legs as we wallow in the gore of our fellow beings? Yes, it is the humble rabbit scurrying this way and that while all other life quails at our tread. If we don't do something soon other species will start to think we aren't serious, and then they'll get all cocky. Today its rabbits but tomorrow it might be bears. Think about it. Frankly I'm surprised nobody introduced them into Australia for the hunting.