Photo: Supplied / DoC
It's spring - and wild rabbits are doing what they excel at - breeding. As well as busily munching and digging up orchards and farms
That's led to a call for local councils to step up and help manage their numbers.
Two common ways to control them are shooting and poisoning - with the responsibility and cost being on the landowners shoulders.
A pest controller who contracts with farmers south of Auckland says rabbit numbers are rising - and even though he only shoots a couple of nights a week he has killed nearly five thousand over the last three years.
The shooter, who didn't want his name used, believes other pests get more attention from regional councils.
"The Councils should focus on rabbits as well as everything else. They seem to be fixated on possums and stoats and weasels and rats, which is fair enough. But rabbits - they don't give a toot about really."
He wants councils to be more proactive about preventing another rise in the rabbit population which could get out of control.
Photo: Supplied / DoC
The pest controller says it's also frustrating for farmers when neighbouring lifestyle block owners go down the rabbit hole of thinking its cute to have lots of loitering free-range bunnies on their land.
"There's a lady down the road who would have over two hundred rabbits running around her place and either side of her the neighbours are complaining like hell because her rabbits are eating all their grass and causing holes."
The rabbit shooter says in recent years he has taken more than six tonnes of rabbit carcasses to a pet food company for processing.
The Auckland Council says it is aware of farmers and lifestyle block owners disagreeing about rabbit control and there will be an opportunity to raise this later in the year.
Dr Imogen Bassett, Auckland Council's Head of Natural Environment Specialist Service, says it's up to landowners to manage how they control pests on their own land.
"We acknowledge that its one thing to be controlling rabbits on your own property but if your neighbour is not then that can be a problem. So I would really encourage people to talk with your neighbours and think about something like maybe a community group might be a more effective way of tackling this in your local area."
However Dr Bassett says a public consultation about Auckland's future pest management priorities will run from Labour weekend through to the beginning of December and suggests landowners make submissions if they have a pest problem.
"I would encourage people - if this is something you see as a priority for the council to be involved with, then there is an upcoming opportunity that you will be hearing more about from us around submitting on what our future priorities should be as a region for the council to invest in in terms of pest management."
She says the council will be getting in touch with Aucklanders so they can have their say.
Dr Bassett says the council is currently more focused on preventing pests from entering the region, such as wallabies which she describes as 'rabbits on steroids', rather than reduce the number of existing wild rabbits.
Wild Wallabies are a major pest problem in central Otago and have spread to parts of the North Island such as the Rotorua Lakes and the Bay of Plenty.
The Department of of Conservation says If left unchecked, its estimated that wallabies could cause 84 million dollars a year in damages and occupy one-third of the country by 2065.
The Ministry of Primary Industries declined to be interviewed, but in a statement said the control of rabbits is currently set by regional councils under their regional pest management plans.
It says this ensures that in regions where rabbits are prolific and damaging, regional authorities can tailor their approach to management.
Rabbit History in New Zealand
Rabbits were brought to New Zealand in the 1830s and released for both sport and food.
This led to plagues and the Department of Conservation says early attempts to control them was one of the country's worst environmental disasters - the introduction of stoats, ferrets and weasels.
These natural enemies of rabbits rarely controlled rabbit numbers effectively but they have been disastrous for native species such as kiwis, takahe and kakapo.
Government investments have been made historically to control rabbits through other means: trapping, shooting, poisoning, gassing, burrow-ripping, pathogens and dogs.
Myxomatosis was introduced in the early 1950s as a form of pathogenic control but, unlike Australia, it failed to establish through lack of a suitable spreading organism.
Rabbit haemorragic disease (RHD) was introduced illegally in 1997. This virus has since controlled rabbits naturally through annual knockdowns.
DOC says the country does not see the devastating rabbit populations of the past but very damaging increases do occur, and RHD is losing its potency.
Landowners, including the Crown, are currently responsible for controlling rabbits on their own land.
