article_snippet.sent: Public land managers are desperate to reduce the most recent 'significantly rampant population' of the pest, which causes millions of dollars of major agricultural and environmental damage each year. '
article_snippet.sent: The program has been implemented annually for the last nine years as a way of managing the pests and 'bringing the population back down again before damage becomes too severe,' Mr Wilson said. '
article_snippet.sent: It's just because in some areas the numbers have shown the rabbit populations haven't gone down as much as we'd like,' Mr Wilson said.
article_snippet.sent: While there are fears of immunity building in local populations, a test ahead of this year's program implementation found only 20 per cent of the local population was immune. '
article_snippet.sent: This means you'd get about an 80 per cent population reduction and that makes a big difference in terms of the damage that they're doing,' Mr Wilson said.
highlights_snippet.sent: Public land managers are now desperate to reduce population numbers due to the millions of dollars worth of damage Public land managers cause .
  