Wild rabbits face welfare pressures from disease, predator management, agricultural control, and the deliberate release of viral hemorrhagic disease. Their welfare deserves far more attention.
Wild rabbits occupy an unusual welfare position: they are simultaneously prey to many valued predators, pest species in agricultural contexts, and the source of companion rabbit domestication. Their welfare is routinely ignored in pest management frameworks that use methods causing significant suffering. The deliberate introduction of myxomatosis and RHDV to control rabbit populations is ethically contested — these are diseases that cause prolonged, painful deaths in millions of animals. The welfare of wild rabbits deserves honest consideration alongside population management objectives.