The Otago Regional Council is considering importing a new Korean strain of the rabbit haemorrhagic disease virus known as ''K5''.
Director of environmental monitoring and operations for the ORC Jeff Donaldson said yesterday authorities in Australia were considering the use of K5 there and he was keen to add it to the council's ''toolbox'' of rabbit control methods.
Approval would be needed from the Environmental Protection Agency.
Mr Donaldson said freeze-dried K5 would be applied to carrot bait as a biocide in the same way 1080 and pindone were used.
It would kill rabbits that ate the carrot but would not cause a disease epidemic.
Regional councils have previously imported variations of the Czech strain which was illegally introduced in 1997.
Mr Donaldson believed K5 was likely to be more effective than the recently identified 95 Mackenzie Basin strain.
