Recent negative trends of wild rabbit populations in southern Spain after the arrival of the new variant of the rabbit hemorrhagic disease virus RHDV2
Autor
Guerrero Casado, José
Carpio, Antonio J.
Sánchez Tortosa, Francisco
Editor
ElsevierFecha
2016Materia
European rabbitOryctolagus cuniculus
RHDV
Virus
Wildlife diseases
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The arrival of a new variant of rabbit haemorrhagic disease virus, known as RHDV2, has recently taken
place in the native range of the European rabbit (Oryctolagus cuniculus), a keystone species which has
undergone a sharp decline over the last sixty years as a consequence of certain harmful factors. Several
works have noted the presence of this new variant in wild rabbit populations, and have in some cases
recorded high mortality rates. However, little is known about the response to the arrival of this new virus
variant at the population level. The goal of this work is therefore to show recent trends in 26 wild rabbit
populations between 2010 (before the outbreak of the disease) and 2014 (after its onset) in two different
ecosystems (woodland and agricultural areas), in order to test how their abundances changed over this
period, which coincided with the spread of the RHDV2. Overall, our results showed that rabbit abundance
was much lower in 2014 than in 2010, and that only 11.5% of the populations monitored proved to have
a positive trend, that is, a higher abundance in 2014 than 2010. A positive correlation between rabbit
abundance in 2010 and rabbit population trends was obtained, thus suggesting that the impact of the
new variant on rabbit abundance is less evident in high density populations. Our results suggest that
smaller rabbit populations are those most vulnerable to the outbreak of RHDV 2 and are therefore likely
to decline sharply or even become extinct.