The rabbit
A burrowing mammal with a seemingly insatiable appetite and a reputation for rapid breeding, the rabbit is a notorious pest that rates highly on the farmer’s hit-list and on the wild gourmet’s menu
Rabbits are a familiar sight around much of the British countryside, and are a mainstay quarry of air rifle hunters, rough shooters and ferreters.
Their population is estimated at over 50 million, and can spike rapidly during the spring and summer months. With adult rabbits able to consume around a pound of fresh green food every day, they can soon munch a dent into farmers’ profits, and many landowners are grateful for assistance in keeping their numbers in check.
Rabbit is held in very high regard by chefs. Land yourself a productive bunny shoot, and time spent bringing the burrowing menace to book will be rewarded with some first-rate meat for the table.
Born survivior
It is thought that rabbits were introduced to Britain sometime around the 12th century. Since then, they have become widespread across a range of habitat from sand dunes to mountainsides. They prefer sites where the digging is easy – hedge banks and railway embankments are among their favourite places to establish their underground colonies.
The rabbit’s reputation for rapid breeding is not exaggerated. A doe can produce a litter of up to six kittens every other month from the age of about 16 weeks. Peak breeding time is from late January through to June but rabbits can breed throughout the year and population explosions are common – especially after mild winters.
Efforts to reduce rabbit numbers saw the deliberate introduction of myxomatosis in the 1950s. Spread by blood-sucking insects, “myxy” causes rabbits a miserable, lingering death. Symptoms include a watery discharge from the eyes and swelling and sores around the eyelids and nose. Rabbits are developing a tolerance to the disease and its impact is not as devastating to populations as it once was. However, they are now faced with rabbit haemorrhagic disease (RHD) which causes blood clots in major organs resulting in rapid respiratory failure.
Persistent pest
The rabbit’s palate extends far beyond its fondness for gobbling grass. They’re partial to root, cereal and salad crops, and cost the agricultural industry an estimated
£100 million every year. They also cause extensive damage to young trees by gnawing their bark. This bark-stripping will often kill saplings, and any that survive are usually deformed.
The rabbit’s burrowing habit causes farmers further headaches. Their excavations do serious damage by undermining hedge banks and field margins. The resulting holes can hamper access for machinery, and pose a danger to people and livestock – horses and ponies have been known to break legs when a misplaced hoof goes down a rabbit burrow.
Closer to home, rabbits love to raid vegetable patches. Their burrowing and scraping can wreck a well-kept lawn and cause unthinkable destruction to a golf course. It’s certainly worth getting in touch with your local golf club if you’re looking for somewhere to harvest rabbit meat with an air rifle.
Challenging sport
Rabbits offer great sport for the shotgun and rimfire shooter. When this pest needs to be controlled in the garden, golf course or in the vicinity of horses, ponies and farm animals, a silenced air rifle is the perfect tool.
Although their eyesight is not excellent, rabbits are well equipped when it comes to detecting danger. They have remarkably acute hearing, a finely tuned sense of smell and an impressive ability to detect vibration through the ground. Stalking within range makes for challenging shooting, although ambush tactics can be more reliable on ground where sustained pressure has made rabbits particularly wary.
During the warmer months, when the days are long, expect to see rabbits above ground at dawn and dusk. At the end of a hot day, hungry bunnies will leave their burrows to feed on dew-softened grass just as the sun starts to sink. This is the season to head to the fields after dinner, and while away the last couple of hours of light bagging bunnies until the swooping swallows are replaced by flitting bats.
As autumn gives way to winter, rabbits become very nocturnal in their habits. By day, they can seem comparatively scarce above ground, but venture out with a lamp or night vision after nightfall and you may be very surprised by the number of eyes you see glinting in the gloom as you scan around the field.