ACCLIMATISED PESTS.

Grey River Argus, Volume XV, Issue 1930, 13 October 1874, Page 4

ACCLIMATISED PESTS.

[southern ckoss.] An old story is told of a Tasmanian settler — a Scotchman — which, while showing the love of his country and its emblems, shows also that the perfervidum ingenium Scotorum, though lovely to the minds of those severely imbued with the hariaa, J»ay, nevertheless, produce disas' irons results. Some thirty or forty years ago this enterprising Highland man built a tine house on a line estate, and dubbed it " Tullochgorum," -which is the name of the old song that takes enthusiastic Celts by the ears and the heels— vide, the wild reel of the same name. A highland friend in Scotland, in the fullness of his heart, sent to this Tasmanian settler a small packet of thistle seeds. Delighted •with the present, like the long-eared quadruped who cheerfully browses on the prickly vegatable, he sowed some of the seeds in the garden of his Vatidemonian home. They grew and flourished, and from those seeds sprang much colonial woe. From them spread all over Tasmania the enrse of the farmer, and thence, the story tells, the thistle seed, by shipboard and by thefloisara of the sea, found its way to every colony in these seas. " Wha daur meddle wi' me!" the thistle has triumphantly been asking of nearly every farmer who suffers from the prevalence of the thistle pest. The unyielding, sturdy, indomitable Scottish thistle, with the " dourness " that marks so many of the race that claim its soil as their faiherland, refuses to be uprooted ; and in Australia and New Zealand it still sends its seedbearing down, wafted by every autumn breeze that blows, all over the land, to the great detriment of the farmer present and to come. The sagacious souls who sought to introduce foxes into Canterbury, and Austral'an snakes into another parb of the island, are on a par with the man who sowed the terrible tare 3of thistle seed in the garden of the Tasmanian Tullochgorum. Colonial Parliaments and Provincial Councils legislate against the thistle in vain. Like " bold John Barleycorn" he disdains and disregards their strongest efforts. He expands his borders, and do what you will, he rears his head in new regions and "sore amazes all." If we attempt to estimate the nundreds of thousands of pounds of loss which this Celtic vagary has caused, one is lost in wonder at the great evils which from little causes spring. The Yankee skipper who sold dock seed to the Maoris which he said was tobacco seed, and which was industriously cultivated by the natives — has left in Auckland a legacy which has spread and is spreading with wild luxuriance, for the dock flourishes with unabated vigour, and takes and retains possession of every piece of ground to which its seed can find its way. This was acclimatisation with a vengeance, and ac climisation societies ought to take heed, and carefully consider their action, and, looking beyond the present, should calculate the ultimate results of every one of their introductions. In the vegetable -world they are not likely to do much barm. Indeed, it must be acknowledged that these societies have done great good ; but in the animal department, who will thank them for the house-sparrow, a little wretch which destroys grapes and cherries, and all other soft fruits to an extent which makes him-tlie curse of the localities which have been madeTnVpsalific habitat ? And the pesky, pert little siiineF-is,^™-iected by Acfc of Parliament ! He brefesls almost as rapidly as the Tabbit, which is another curse to sheep farmers, and yet, if any one should kill one of the little ■wretches he is guilty of a breach of the laws of his country, and is liable to a fine. We knew a person who discovered half a dozen sparrows' and starlings' nests in the eaves and projections of his dwell-ing-house, and who, despite the law, ruthlessly killed the young birds in some cases, and broke the eggs in others, and we have tolerably good reason for believing that ' • so he will again," the law and acclimatisation societies notwithstanding. Is it to be borne that in any grape and cherry and strawberry-growing country, — to name no other soft fruits — these predatory fowls are to be permitted every time the sun rises to despoil the owners of carefully-trained vines and plants and trees ? Legislation cannot cope with the thistle, but if legislation persists in preserving and protecting these feathered pests, then we say that cultivators of fruits have no resource but that of poisoned wheat, or, haply, the fowlingpiece, and encouragement of that juvenile modification of the sling of the psalmist — the tolerably effective catapault, which, in the hands of quick- eyed boys, is by no means a despicable weapon. Imagine a careful tender of a pet vine, watching the coming of the purple bloom on divers bunches of grapes, which would have gladened the eyes of the Israelitish explorers of Canaan, waking up some fine morning to discover them utterly ruined by the bills of the too prevalent housesparrow. This is no uncommon occurrences ; scores of people can bear testimony to its frequency, and the power to "kill, slay, and- destroy " the house sparrow cannot be too soon bestowed. We might say something of the depredations of the pheasant, but, by the act just passed by the Assembly, superintendents are authorised to empower the destruction of these birds at seasons hitherto by 2aw declared to be " close." We can do little, legislatively or otherwise, to kill the thistle, but we can do much to stay the damage of the various and too prolific pests in the shape of fruit-eating and feathered bipeds.