00:02Hundreds of feral rabbits causing havoc on one of WA's oldest golf courses.
00:08Without doubt this is definitely the most rabbits we've ever seen.
00:11Yeah, so it's a real concern.
00:13I would say they've doubled if not tripled over the last two years.
00:16Rabbits cause more than $200 million in agricultural production losses every year, according to government estimates.
00:25It's a growing problem being felt across the region and beyond.
00:28A lot of farmers actually come in saying the same thing, it's just they've got a plaguing problem.
00:33Farmers are desperately trying to eliminate the introduced pest.
00:37A few of the farms that I go out to have massive crops and you just see acres of land
00:43just getting destroyed by them.
00:45Farmers say biocontrols like viruses aren't as effective as they used to be.
00:50I think the Khaleesi virus and myxomatosis back then was sort of controlling their numbers a little bit,
00:58but I think over time they've just built up this immunity.
01:012.6 million dollars was allocated for a new rabbit biocontrol study in this year's federal budget,
01:08with the government saying new tools are needed to reduce rabbit populations nationally.
01:14We do need a new one every 10 to 15 years as the rabbits breed themselves out of it,
01:19so there's always going to be a requirement for us to bring a new one online.
01:23An ongoing challenge for farmers looking for help to fight a national problem.
01:2800.
01:2800.
01:2900.
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