Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (USA) published an interesting article about Australia’s rabbits.

The British colonialists brought rabbits to Australia 1788 and sooner or later one or two of the rabbits managed to find their way into the wild. But domestic rabbits cannot find their way in the wild and are therefore easy prey.

Today there are around 200 million rabbits living in Australia. The rabbits, which are a real nuisance for farmers, are now an invasive animal species in Australia. They threaten plant and animal species and cause damage to agriculture every year. It is interesting that these rabbits have the same ancestor – 24 British rabbits that came to Australia with the colonialist Thomas Austin.

Augustin won a property near Melbourne. Australia’s invasive rabbit population likely descends from two dozen wild English rabbits that arrived near Melbourne in 1859. A genome analysis now suggests this. These rabbits were very shy and cautious and still had many of the wild rabbit genes. They were not easy prey and that is why they survived and spread so quickly to this day.

Source

Heather Chen, How 24 British rabbits took over Australia, CNN, August 24, 2022.