Rabbit haemorrhagic disease (RHD) - Ireland, confirmed in the wild for the first time

Almost certain it is what almost eradicated rabbits from our land over the last coupla three yrs. They are slowly coming back but bizarrely the hare are doing really well. Better numbers than I have seen in many years. I never ever fail to see at least one when I am out, even for a short period.

The cattle have just grazed down the hill where a number of rabbits used to reside and the wheat is being cut this week, so that will also reveal the large gorse margins where rabbit numbers have historically been good. Fingers crossed they have done well over spring/summer and there are some late evening forays on the cards in the next few weeks to put some good meat in the freezer.
 
Maybe only just been confirmed but its been here for at least 10 years , where there used to be hundreds of rabbits now there are none
 
Funny thing , I've been finding non myxi dead rabbits for a good few years now in north Meath. I had presumed all along that it was RHD which I read up on at the time. In fact I haven't found a myxi rabbit since the 'sudden death' syndrome appeared. My local population peaks and crashes about every three years. This year was a peak and crash year - my spaniels ran themselves ragged after the live ones and then pigged out on the corpses. Initially I thought they had managed to catch some.
Incidentally my friends in Sligo and Mayo say its been a bumper year for hares. Round here the burgeoning buzzard population gets the blame for the low number of hares. My local beagle pack struggled to find hares last season.

Ion
 
Adult rabbits are hard on leverets, I was once told. It does seem for whatever reason that when the rabbits get a pasting the hares flourish, though someone with a better grasp of the mechnics of this may well be better placed to explain. I do know rabbits to be quite aggressive to their own kind.
 
Is this what was called VHD years ago? If so it's been in England for blumin years as it was knocking about when I had my ferrets an lurchers and that's much longer ago than I care for remembering
 
Is this what was called VHD years ago? If so it's been in England for blumin years as it was knocking about when I had my ferrets an lurchers and that's much longer ago than I care for remembering
Yes, VHD by another name. Has been around for years but a few years ago a new strain, so called VHD2 appeared, which has hammered the rabbit population in many areas. Numbers around me just picking up after about three years of very few rabbits.
 
This is why:

"In the 1980s, the European rabbit populations were devastated by a virus that caused an extremely lethal and highly contagious disease, rabbit haemorrhagic disease (RHD). The 1st outbreak of this new disease was reported in 1984 in the Jiangsu Province of China within a group of commercially-bred Angora rabbits imported from Germany. As the virus spread worldwide, naturally occurring RHD outbreaks were reported in geographically distant regions, such as Cuba, Uruguay and Reunion Island.

RHD is a highly virulent lagovirus endemic in Europe and Australasian populations of the European rabbit. It has also caused several unexplained disease outbreaks in domestic European rabbits in North America.

RHD is characterised by high morbidity and high mortality (70-90%), and spreads very rapidly by direct and indirect transmission. Infection can occur by nasal, conjunctival or oral routes. Transmission of RHD is facilitated by the high stability of the virus in the environment. Lesions are primary liver necrosis and a massive disseminated intravascular coagulopathy in all organs and tissues. The most severe lesions are in the liver, trachea and lungs.

RHD-2 is a variant form of the original RHD-1 virus and differs in the following ways.
- Rabbits infected with the RHD-2 virus typically DO NOT show the symptoms that are common with RHD-1 infection so it is far more difficult to diagnose from simple observations.
- Death from RHD-2 occur later and over a longer period of time than RHD-1: typically this is 3-9 days following infection and can last up to 5 days, instead of 2-6 days infection and lasting 3-4 days as generally observed with classical RHD-1. Although this is marginal it is important to note from a quarantine perspective.
- Only following post-mortem examination will initial diagnosis be possible, however further tests are required to definitively confirm RHD-2 which is now recommended for unexplained deaths.
- In mainland Europe, RHD-2 is now very common particularly in France where it was 1st identified in 2010 and spread country-wide where it was mainly transmitted through the wild rabbit population with cross-over with domestic rabbits. In Italy it has not spread very wide given the differences in wild rabbit population density. A research study has been published that describes the proliferation in RHD-2 in France since 2010 and of relevance to the current situation in the Great Britain and Ireland.

RHD-2 is a genetically and antigenically different from RHD-1, and the immunogenic differences occur at the serotype level, for which vaccination against both variants is needed.

These viruses, which have been circulating in pet rabbits, have now reached wild populations in Ireland. The impact of this pathogen in these populations is a concern for the conservation of wild rabbits. Continued surveillance should be implemented to assess this impact".

Portions of this comment were extracted from https://www.oie.int/fileadmin/Home/eng/Animal_Health_in_the_World/docs/pdf/Disease_cards/RHD.pdf.
 
Just briefly at the moment, i will look into this when I have more time.
If I remember correctly this virus was manufactured or altered in the late 70s early 80s to control the rabbit population in Australia. 1st trials were extremely effective, in fact too effective, it cleared rabbits only in very close proximity to the initial trial. It failed to spread very far and so they looked into weakening the strain to give it a chance to spread to different rabbit colonies.
It wasn't accepted very well at the time that I can remember well, also the worry of it being used in Europe, seems like its been here for a while now.
 
We have been finding large numbers of dead 1/3 grown rabbits in upper wensleydale with pinkish coloured blood in their mouths and noses.Some say vhd others are saying not vhd due to no blood around their arse.Seems to be very localised though.One pasture is wiped out the next isnt affected.
 
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