NATURAL HISTORY NOTES

Otago Daily Times, Issue 23500, 14 May 1938, Page 25

NATURAL HISTORY NOTES

Written for the Otago Daily Times By David H. Graham THE INTRODUCED RABBIT The introduction of the rabbit into New Zealand has proved an unmitigated pest, although considerable revenue is derived from the sale of skins and carcasses, to say nothing of the employment given to rabbitei's. curers and meat preservers. It is said that we annually export tinned rabbits to the value of £500,000, to say nothing of the cured skins, which are dressed in imitation of more valuable furs, the suffix or prefix ’’coney ” indicating their real nature. It is not often that such a plague cai. be turned to such a golden account, and there are successful farmei’s of to-day who can claim that it was from the proceeds of rabbiting that they obtained a start. That is one side of the ledger. On the other side, it is not possible to estimate the damage done to this country, for we know that many squatters and farmers were absolutely ruined and that immense ai’eas of grazing country had to be abandoned, as it was not possible to continue the struggle against their fast-multiplying animals. Through them, sheep perished from starvation to the tune of thousands in the eighties. As far back as 1883 a qualified authority assessed the actual loss to the colony at £ 1,700,000 annually, but another contra account is one that is impossible to put into pounds, shillings and pence, and that is the destruction of our native birds through the introduction by acclimatisation societies of more pests in the form of stoats, weasels and ferrets, which were supposed to keep the rabbit down. The toll these animals have taken of our native birds, to say nothing of imported game, is beyond words. Then, again, rabbits are very destructive animals and sad depredations in field, garden and plantation are common. They delight in stripping trees of their tender bark as far as they can reach while standing on their hind legs. This habit is merely for the sake of exercising their teeth and claws, just as a cat delights in clawing the legs of chairs and tables. It is interesting to note that in 1857 the weka or woodhen took in hand to control the rabbit by making a practice of entering burrows, killing and eating the young ones to such an extent that the country in and around Waitahuna was almost rid of them for a while.

One correspondent has fallen into the error of thinking that the rabbit was a native of Britain. It was first introduced from Africa by the Romans into Spain, whence it spread to all temperate climates. The earliest record in Britain is in 1390 for, at the installation of the feast of the Abbot of St. Augustine, 600 rabbits were provided at a cost of sixpence apiece, at that time the price of the common pig.

Rabbits breed about seven times a year if conditions are suitable, bringing fourth from seven to eight each time. On the supposition, therefore, that this happens regularly, at the end of four years a couple of rabbits could see a progeny of almost a million and a-half. The female begins to breed at the age of six or eight months, and when she is about to become a mother, quits the family burrow and digs a special tunnel for the purpose of sheltering her young family for the first few weeks of life. At the extreme end of her burrow she places a quantity of dry grass and down from her own body, so as to make a soft, warm bed for the expected occupants. The young are born without hair, and are blind and deaf as well as helpless. The doe suckles her young for about four weeks, covering them over with bedding whenever she goes to feed. It has been told to me that the father of the young has a habit of devouring them, and that this explains a separate burrow, but this is quite wrong, as I have often seen the male attending to the young, leading them out to feed and conducting them back upon the return of the dam.

The hare and the rabbit, though closely resembling each other, are yet distinct and refuse to mix, although Buffon is said to have crossed them. The rabbit has one art of defence, but in that one it finds safety by making a hole, where it lives during some of the day, not that it wants to do so, for it loves sunny fields and open pastures. _ A rabbit warren presents an amusing spectacle when visited at the close of day or by the light of the moon, when all sizes may be seen gambolling and sporting, chasing one another, even appearing to play “ tig ” and “ follow my leader,” like lambs, with astonishing rapidity. When they are alarmed, their flight to their holes is instant, especially when mother and father rabbit give the signal to go, as is done by striking the ground forcibly with their hind feet. This signal sends the young scudding towards their burrows, or bounding over scrub and herbage. It is in this retreat that we can observe the white undersurface of the rabbit’s tail, which is for a very useful purpose, to wit, a danger signal, for on the least alarm they cock the tail over the back, exposing to full view the white surface, which thus shows conspicuously and serves as a guide to those behind, and thus they help each other to safety. I have seen them swim rivers to escape from dog and from man and gun.

A correspondent, Mr J. Ballard, of St. Kilda. has sent the head of a rabbit which had the lower teeth curved and pressing against the skull, and would have entered the head eventually had it lived. These animals have front teeth that grow continually and have enamel on the front edge, and when the lower meets the upper they are kept sharp by continual biting and chewing. In 193? several correspondents wrote to me concerning hydatids in rabbits: but. although the rabbit is frequently supposed to spread hydatid disease, infection with the true hydatid parasite has never been reported. The large tapeworm cyst recently sent to me by Mr Williams, of Waikouaiti, is the cystic stage of a large tapeworm of the dog and has no relation to health. > Mr Ridgely, of Brighton, has askecl if rabbits are polygamous. I do not know for certain, but I understand that they pair and remain so for life. Mr J. Mackenzie gave me some very interesting information about rabbits during the day after the Tarawera eruption, which I have not seen mentioned in any literature. Mr Mackenzie had been in the habit of visiting his rabbit traps each morning before sunrise in order to kill the caught rabbits and reset the traps. On the morning after the eruption he was surprised to find that each rabbit that had been injured by the teeth of the trap was dead, and that, on his handling each rabbit, the skin left the body as though it had been steeped in quicklime. This phenomenon continued for two days, after which rabbits were again found alive in the traps. It has been suggested that sulphur fumes may have killed those that died, as thousands of eels, trout and minnows were found dead at the

same time, belly upwards, on the correspondent wants to know if the “coney” alluded to m the Bible is our common rabbit. 1 do not know, but there is a tailless rabbit in Syria and Kaffirland, *ind it may be the coney alluded to in the Psalms, as the term “ coney is a common expression for rabbits in some parts. , . , Weasels appear to have a knack of paralysing a rabbit if one is approaching and has not seen the weasel until too late. I was once sitting on the edge of a plantation and saw this happen. When the rabbit noticed its enemy, it stood stock still, and not until the weasel had jumped on to its back did it utter’its piteous, almost human, cry. The weasel nipped it behind the ears; but the writer got the rabbit.