Otago has to wait until next year for rabbit virus release

There has been an upsurge in rabbit numbers, including in Central Otago. Photo / ODT File

Hopes that a new variant of the rabbit haemorrhagic disease virus would be swiftly approved in Otago have been dashed, meaning it will not be deployed until next year.

Approached for comment, Otago Regional Council chairman Stephen Woodhead urged landowners to continue ''to do some rabbit control'' in the meantime, which also would improve the effectiveness of an eventual virus release.

''They are responsible for rabbit control on their properties,'' Mr Woodhead said yesterday.

And he pledged that council staff would do ''everything we need to do'' to be ''ready to go'' late next summer or early next autumn to use the variant virus, once regulatory approval had been gained.

In February, New Zealand's Environmental Protection Authority determined that the Korean strain of the RHDV1 rabbit virus was neither a new organism, nor a hazardous substance.

ORC staff have pointed out that the EPA viewed the new strain as a variant of the existing RHDV1 virus which was already in Otago.

Council director, environmental monitoring and operations, Scott MacLean said an application to use the new variant in New Zealand, including in Otago, was now being assessed by the Agricultural Chemicals and Veterinary Medicines group.

The group's process for considering such applications took up to 70 days, and it was ''likely the process will run the full allocation of time'', he said in a report tabled at a council regulatory committee meeting yesterday.

Should the approval to import be granted, this would put the planned release ''outside the window of opportunity'' - in autumn - that associated science had shown was the best time for the release of the virus.

In light of this, the New Zealand Rabbit Co-ordination Group, which included the council, had ''made the prudent decision'' to delay the release until next autumn.

Council staff were planning to hold community meetings to discuss the K5 project and to ''stress the need to remain patient''.

It was ''crucial'' any importation and subsequent release were carried out ''in a controlled manner using the commercially prepared product'' to ensure ''maximum efficacy'', Mr MacLean said.

The council had earlier approved spending up to $50,000 to co-ordinate the release of the Korean strain to counter an upsurge in rabbit numbers, including in Central Otago.