The Daily Telegraph. FRIDAY, JANUARY 13, 1888.

Daily Telegraph (Napier), Issue 5117, 13 January 1888, Page 2

The Daily Telegraph. FRIDAY, JANUARY 13, 1888.

"We remind persons who arc competent, for the position that applications for the oflico of sub-inspectorof rabbitsiuust be forwarded to the chairman of tho Board of Rabbit Trustees not later than noon on Saturday next. The sub-inspector is required for the northern division or tho Hawke's Bay dis trict. The salary is .£2OO a year, without travelling or other allowances. The Board is to bo congratulated on its determination to make an appointment of this kind ; and it is to be hoped that an energetic, and competent person will be found to take the position. There is a very large extent of country in the northern division that wants much closer inspection than can be given it by one inspector having his head-quarters at the southern boundary. Mr Crosse is an indefatigable and zealous ofiieer, but he cannot be everywhere, and it is duo to him, as well as to the ratepayers that he should be relieved from the inspection of tho large district extending northwards from Waipukurau. From the last report of the Inspector it is evident that rabbits are to be found more or less scattered over the whole country ; and it is of the utmost importance that tho fullest information should bo obtained as to the extent of the evil, and tho mo.-t thorough measures adopted to suppress the pest. From what we can gather, it would appear that some of our shoepfarmors are not so fully impressed as they should bo with the frightful potentialities of even a couple of rabbits on their property, and this apathy may lead to terrible results. It is of very little use for stoekownors to pay rab-s to keep oil the plague if thoy do nothing themselves to destroy the rabbits they know to be on their own country. It is quite possible that-many landowner are disinclined to believe in "the possibility of rabbits becoming so numerous as to get almost beyond human power to control, and although they have read of this being tho case, and they are aware that large districts both in New Zealand and Australia havo had to be abandoned, they still cling to the hope that such a thing cannot occur in Hawke's Bay. We have met settlers who have pooh-poohed the "rabbit searo " as they call it; who acknowledge that they have had ''tame rabbits gone wild" on their runs for years, and that, as they have not increased," so they ask what is there to be alarmed at *r The strictest administration of the Rabbit Prevention Act is the best remedy for indifference of this kind, and with a closer inspection of suspected country we should not be surprised if this remedy is not discovered to bo necessary.