AN INTERNATIONAL group of scientists has joined a call for action to protect the native Irish hare which is said to be under extreme threat from imported European “brown” hares.
Ireland’s foremost authority on the hare, Dr Neil Reid of Queen’s University Belfast, said the European or “English” hare was introduced to the North in the early 1800s by coursing interests. It poses a major threat to the Irish hare, especially in mid-Ulster and west Tyrone.
Dr Reid, who said he had reports but no confirmed sightings of the European brown hare in the Republic, said the interbreeding of the two species was a form of “genetic pollution”. His latest study on the impact of introducing the European hare here showed they exhibited strong competition for habitat space and food resources with the native hares, and, as a result, native numbers declined.
The study, published in the international journal Biological Invasions, has received the support of a panel of international experts.
A group of scientists, part of the Lagomorph Specialist Group of the International Union for the Conservation of Nature, the world’s foremost authority on threatened species, signed a foreword to accompany the paper as an urgent call for further research.
The scientists have sought a European hare “Invasive Species Action Plan” and eradication strategy, which Dr Reid said could only be carried out after further study.
He said diseases carried by the European hare and the transmission of parasites to the native animals – in addition to the fact the European hare was native to west Europe and parts of Asia and would benefit from climate change – gave the invader an edge over the native species.
“The Irish hare represents an evolutionary unique lineage, which is restricted to Ireland where it has been present since before the last glacial maximum, making it one of our few native mammal species,” he said.