The 19th century pastoralist Thomas Austin was homesick. He yearned for the pastimes of his home in England – especially rabbit hunting. He asked his family to send him some rabbits.

On Christmas Day in 1859, around two dozen wild and domestic rabbits arrived in Australia.

Delighted, Austin released them on his Barwon Park estate near Geelong. A member of the Acclimatisation Society of Victoria, Austin was among many working to bring European animal species to Australia. Of his efforts, he would later write:

the introduction of a few rabbits could do little harm and might provide a touch of home, in addition to a spot of hunting

the introduction of a few rabbits could do little harm and might provide a touch of home, in addition to a spot of hunting

Domestic rabbits first came to Australia with the First Fleet. But these introductions were domestic rabbits and didn’t establish.

Austin’s rabbits fared differently, as they were from wild genetic stock and much better suited to establishing self-sustaining populations. These rabbits began one of the most devastating biological invasions in Australia’s history. Rabbits, after all, breed like rabbits.

Every Australian knows common myna birds are bad, rabbits are worse and feral cats kill native animals unchecked.

But how do we decide what makes an introduced species “good” or “bad” – and will we ever concede that some species are here to stay?

Our new series on invasive species explores these questions.

It didn’t take long for rabbits to go from desirable to undesirable. In the 1950s, CSIRO scientists........

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