Rabbits are not native to Australia but 24 of them were introduced in the 1850's for hunting purposes. A mere fifty years later they had bred as rabbits will,fast enough to become crop destroying pests. This is where the rabbit proof fence came to be (no not the movie) the province of Western Australia built the fence to try to stop the rabbits from further migration. This left Australians with the Easter Bunny dilemma which they solved in the 1990's with the introduction of the Easter Bilby. Bilbies are seriously cute and in my opinion an excellent choice as a replacement. They are marsupials (bandicoots) that are covered in silky blue-gray fur,their tails are black and white with a crest running its entire length. For the most part they live solitary lives in burrows, and are nocturnal,feeding mostly on termites,grubs and ants. The females can have four litters a year,with one or two joeys per litter. The pregnancy lasts two weeks and the joeys stay in her pouch for ten weeks. After leaving the pouch they suckle for another two weeks and are weaned around three months and can start breeding when they are less than six months old. The bilby is vulnerable to extinction as the young can fall prey to feral cats and foxes will dig them out of their burrows. There are programs in place to bring the bilby back from the edge of extinction.
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