Rabbits became a big disaster in Australia

 The number of rabbits in Australia is around 200 million. Which has become a new disaster for the country. Actually, rabbits are not native to Australia. They are considered invasive species there. The story of the arrival of these rabbits to Australia is very interesting.

This is about 1859. On 25 December Christmas, a ship from England arrived at the port of Melbourne, Australia. In this, 24 rabbits came as a Christmas present for a man named Thomas Austin. Austin was from England and settled in Melbourne. They wanted to keep a lot of rabbits in their compound. So his brother had gifted European rabbits from England. It contained both wild and domesticated rabbits.

5 rabbits arrived in Sydney in 1788. In the next 70 years, 90 more rabbits came to Australia, but by inheritance, most belonged to the Austin rabbits.

Austin's wish came true. Thousands of rabbits were born from these rabbits in 3 years. Now these rabbits are damaging crops and local plants. The overpopulation in Australia is one of the most devastating examples of biological invasion. It is considered to be the fastest colonization of mammals brought from outside. This causes an agricultural loss of about Rs 1,600 crore to Australia annually.

Recent research has shown that rabbits sent to Austin took 80 days by ship to reach Melbourne, spread over 100 km per year . During this interbreeding took place in both types of rabbits. So these rabbits spread at the rate of 100 km per year. In 50 years, they spread over an area 13 times larger.