Is N.Z. opening the gates to a hungry horde?

Press, 31 October 1981, Page 16

Is N.Z. opening the gates to a hungry horde?

By

PHYLLIS KERR-NORTH

Having lived through the time when the wild rabbit pestilence almost wrecked the country. I was astounded ■to read recently that illegal New Zealand Black and New Zealand Red rabbits are being kept as pets and, worse, are not being confined to their owner’s properties.

I was reminded of action taken by the newly constituted Rabbit- Destruction Council in 1947, when a little girl wept as her rabbit cage was emptied by order of the local board in its application of the strict policy of eradication of that terrible pest. No one wishes to deprive children of their pet rabbits, but there are rules relating to' the confinement and the breed. I was and still am fearful of the great risk the Government took, a few years ago, when it legalised rabbit farming. I know that the keeping of rabbits for farming is confined by law to six breeds: the Angora, Californian, Chinchilla, Flemish Giant, New Zealand White and Rex: pure breeds only. But the Ministry of Agriculture livestock officer says that crosses have been made between each other or with feral rabbits, and these crosses can survive in urban areas where there is good cover and a ready availability of feed.

No one can convince me that any one breed or cross is less fertile, or less given to multiplication, or less destructive of ground cover, than any other.

When Nature gave the brutes their law

To some she gave the tooth, the claw. The poison fang, the lightning speed. Me, she bade only, “Breed, Breed.” When Arnold Wall, an Englishman, came to Canterbury College as Professor of English language and, literature in 1898, he was horrified, during his first trip through Central Otago, by the destruction caused byhordes of rabbits and by the problems' facing the -runholders there; he wrote “Brer Rabbit of Central Otago.”

I have no doubt it was intended, throughout its seven amusing but vigorous verses to shock somebody into action.

As I travelled last week through the incomparable loveliness of Central Otago, the • Lindis, and Mackenzie Country, my mind went back to what that country had been like when it was “worn

to the bones." It has recovered remarkably from its ravaging when rabbits ate practically every blade of grass as' it grew; but still there for all to see are the shingle slips in that land of naturally thin soils, warning posterity of the danger of removing nature's sparse cover.

The sad story of “The Hungry Horde” in Canterbury began when the French ship, L'Aube. bringing colonists to Akaroa in 1840, brought also a menagerie which included seven rabits. Knowing how they multiply it is reasonable to suppose that the pair given to Godley in 1851 were progeny, several generations later, of some of those of the menagerie. In 1862 two officials of the Southland Provincial Council

introduced English wild rabbits as “Grand sport for the boys." Other settiers elsewhere did the same; one clearing five acres and sowing it down in “buckwheat” to turn them out on.

Yet. in 1882. with rivers seeming no barrier to their spread. C. G. Tripp was only laughed at for his pessimistic forecast of. the danger of those animals then spreading far and wide.

Sheep runs were being eaten out; and income from rabbits rose while that from sheep fell. In Southland a meat preserving works took 2000 carcases a day for six months, and a million skins were exported in 1894; but, on one run alone, in ten years, shearing dropped from 1300 bales of wool to 500.

Worried men brought in

weasels, stoats and ferrets, and put up long lines of rabbit-proof fences, as well as trapping, shooting and poisoning. Still rabbits increased and hillsides in the back-country became a moving picture. The farmer described sights “that cause a person to shudder when he thinks how the poor emaciated scarecrows of sheep live.” A heavy snowstorm of 1895 performed a good service, and land owners urged the Government "to take advantage of nature’s assistance and properly check the terrible inroad of animals before we are all ruined.” They urged inspectors to intensify their efforts in carrying out the provisions of the “Rabbit Nuisance Act” of 1882 — the destruction of all rabbits on

private and Crown lands. Some did their work well. One became so enthusiastic about getting results that he sent this letter to a farmer in 1900: “I was down jour way last week, and I seen a heli of a lot of rabbits. You haven’t done a damn thing about them'since last time I stirred you up. Now therefore take notice that me being an inspector under the act require you to commence rabbit destruction work immediately in default of which you’ll go to jail, which will probably be a bloody good thing as far as you’re concerned. This is the last bloody warning you're getting."’ But it wasn’t until 1947 that the Rabbit Destruction Amendment Act was passed to set up contiguous boards with rating powers, and with a killer policy as the signature tune. Various methods were employed; dogs and guns had their place, hand laid poison was used and poison was dropped from aircraft. All contributed to the success of the council’s policy.

Grass has grown again on the recovered hills and sheep grow fat. but only constant vigilance will keep the pest at bay, farmers from ruin, and the country from disaster at home and abroad. We would all wish rabbit farming a success, especially when a return of $5 to $7 a carcase is indicated. But constant vigilance towards escapers will always be needed.