• Home
  • News
  • Sport
  • Entertainment
  • Local History
  • Contact Us
  • Advertise With Us
  • About Us
  • Subscribe
  • Read Our Newspapers Online
    • Read the Latest Western Port News
    • Read the Latest Mornington News
    • Read the Latest Southern Peninsula News
    • Read the Latest Frankston Times
    • Read the Latest Chelsea Mordialloc Mentone News
Facebook Twitter Instagram
Trending
  • Big Al wows ’em, Strikers uproar
  • Felicia eyes off further black type
  • Edithvale-Aspendale get on the board, Stonecats impress
  • Alteration of subway plans for Frankston
  • Peta Murphy wins second term in Dunkley
  • Shire’s carbon neutral backflip
  • Fee rise puts golfers in rough
  • Reserve price puts shire off
Facebook Twitter
MPNEWSMPNEWS
  • Home
  • News
  • Sport
  • Entertainment
  • Local History
  • Contact Us
  • Advertise With Us
  • About Us
  • Subscribe
MPNEWSMPNEWS
Home»Latest News»Tree farmer fears rabbit plague
Latest News

Tree farmer fears rabbit plague

By Stephen TaylorMarch 29, 2021Updated:March 30, 2021No Comments4 Mins Read
Colin Fitches Rabbits - Hastings. Photo: One of the rabbit's I saw on Colin's property. I couldn't get very close.
Share
Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Pinterest Email

A FORMER Christmas tree grower says that the Mornington Peninsula is heading towards a rabbit plague.

Ron Reaper, who ran Santa’s Place on the corner of Moorooduc Highway and Bentons Road, Moorooduc, for 18 years, said he “fought rabbits the whole time and never got them under control”.

Now he fears rabbits are about to get out of control.

“As soon as I cleaned up my place they would come back from other people’s places,” he said.

“We were poisoning them all the time but never got on top of them.”

Mr Reaper said that when the rabbits ran out of grass, they began ringbarking his trees which he then began strapping with protective PVC piping.

He said other baiting attempts, such as using poisoned grain, endangered other animals, including birds.

“Unless something can be done – especially after two good breeding seasons – the whole peninsula will be awash with [rabbits],” he said.

Pindone poison causes internal bleeding and rabbits can take six to 14 days to die. It can also kill small animals and some birds; dogs would need to eat about 90 pellets for it to be fatal.

It is sold under several different commercial names and is just one of many methods used to control rabbits, along with viruses myxomatosis and calicivirus, and 1080 poison.

Professor Sharon Beder, of Wollongong University, says pindone has the potential to kill other animals including humans, pets and wildlife (“Drive to rid golf course of rabbits” The News 10/2/21).

She said it is used in urban-fringe areas in preference to 1080 “because of its slower killing time, and the availability of an antidote, make it less dangerous to use around humans and pets … factors [that] will not prevent the poisoning of wildlife”.

Prof Beder, in a 2011 paper “Pindone rabbit baiting – cruel and careless”, said pindone “kills by interfering with blood clotting, causing fatal hemorrhages”.

She said pindone was poisonous to wallabies, kangaroos, possums, antechinus, bandicoots, owls and other birds of prey, which ate animal carcasses. It is used in New Zealand for killing rabbits, possums and wallabies.

Mr Reaper told Hastings MP Neale Burgess that he had “trouble getting anyone in authority to realise that this rabbit problem is not just a Hastings or Moorooduc problem, it is a problem all over the peninsula”.

“I’ve spent a lot of money on baiting over the past 15 years, to no avail, and when you kill a few rabbits others migrate from other areas,” he said.

After complaints to Agriculture Minister Mary-Anne Thomas, Mr Reaper was contacted by the department’s biosecurity officer and offered information on integrated pest control, such as fencing and buying the K5 virus, but the department took no direct action on the rabbits.

The minister told him pest numbers could only be controlled “when all landholders take coordinated action over a number of years”.

“What I’m seeing now is that we could be at the start of a peninsula-wide plague,” said Mr Reaper.

“As a young bloke I lived through a rabbit plague at Kerang when there were literally millions of them eating through everything.”

While it is illegal to allow wild rabbits to populate a property, he said there were few – if any – Agriculture Department inspectors keeping check on the peninsula.

Mornington Peninsula Shire’s interim director of place Jessica Wingad told The News earlier this month that the shire did “not provide rabbit control services for private property but are happy to assist owners with advice on how to go about it”.

Mr Reaper’s concerns mirror those of Hastings man Colin Fitches who said rabbits were coming from a much larger property behind his 0.809 hectare block on Hodgins Road. (“Landowner seeks help to avoid rabbit takeover” The News 2/3/21).

He warned the situation was so dire “we must act now with a program of control to save our peninsula from devastation by rabbits”.

“I believe we need an eradication program controlled by the Department of Agriculture or the Mornington Peninsula Shire or both,” he said.

“Surely prevention is better than cure.”

With Keith Platt

First published in the Southern Peninsula News – 30 March 2021

Share. Facebook Twitter Pinterest LinkedIn Tumblr Email

Related Posts

Liberals keep Flinders but lose government

May 23, 2022

One-way gates the way out for kangaroos

May 23, 2022

Affordable housing flyer ‘misleading’

May 23, 2022

Shire accused of political bias

May 23, 2022
Add A Comment

Comments are closed.

Weather
May 23, 2022 - Mon
Mornington, Australia
13°C
clear sky
clear sky
1 m/s, SE
63%
770.32 mmHg
mon05/23 tue05/24 wed05/25 thu05/26 fri05/27
sky is clear
12/11°C
sky is clear
14/10°C
overcast clouds
15/13°C
moderate rain
15/14°C
light rain
15/13°C
Peninsula Essence Magazine

Click here to read

April 27, 2022
Peninsula Kids Magazine

Click here to read

March 2, 2022
Council Watch

Shire’s carbon neutral backflip

May 23, 2022

Shire offers $500,000 to performing arts

May 2, 2022
Elections 2022

Peta Murphy wins second term in Dunkley

May 23, 2022

Shire accused of being off track with pledges

May 17, 2022

Security takes precedence

May 17, 2022
Interview

Volunteers track koalas for science

May 2, 2022
Property of the Week

278 Dundas Street, Rye

May 11, 2022
100 Years Ago This Week

Alteration of subway plans for Frankston

May 23, 2022
Contact
Street: 63 Watt Road, Mornington, 3931
Mailing: PO Box 588, Hastings, 3915
Menu
  • Home
  • News
  • Sport
  • Entertainment
  • Local History
  • Contact Us
  • Advertise With Us
  • About Us
  • Subscribe
About

Established in 2006, Mornington Peninsula News Group (MPNG) is a locally owned and operated, independent media company.

MPNG publishes five weekly community newspapers: the Western Port News, Mornington News, Southern Peninsula News, Frankston Times and Chelsea Mordialloc Mentone News.

MPNG also publishes two glossy magazines: Peninsula Essence and Peninsula Kids.

Facebook Twitter
© 2022 Mornington Peninsula News Group.

Type above and press Enter to search. Press Esc to cancel.