When Nelson Mandela and other political activists were imprisoned on Robben Island they little guessed their vital contribution to the ecosystem.
Prison wardens on the island hunted rabbits, the meat being a welcome addition to the inmates' generally meagre rations.
Fifteen years after the end of white minority rule, the wardens and prisoners have gone and the unchecked rabbit population has exploded to at least 25,000, prompting warnings of an "environmental disaster" at the World Heritage Site. Officials now plan a shooting cull of thousands of rabbits, as well as fallow deer, cats, guinea fowl and rats.
The rabbits are apparently causing "absolute havoc" by destroying vegetation and burrowing under historic buildings at the popular tourist attraction off Cape Town. Spokesman Dennis Cruywagen said he could only speculate whether these included Mandela's former cell.
"They destroy just about all the vegetation on the island," he said. "That has a knock-on effect as there's no grazing left for the fallow deer."
He said the lack of vegetation, combined with sandstorms, would erode the coast of the 47-hectare island. "Environmentally the future of the island is in danger."
The island's cats, meanwhile, target penguin chicks, threatened oystercatchers and endangered bank cormorants. A census earlier this year counted only 2,400 breeding penguin pairs, compared with more than 6,000 in 2007.
Rabbits were introduced to Robben Island by European sailors more than 300 years ago. The empire builders found it easier to breed them there than on the mainland, where they met resistance from indigenous peoples. The fallow deer came from Europe in the mid-20th century.
