The Rabbit Question.

Southland Times, Issue 9362, 30 October 1886, Page 3

The Rabbit Question.

TO THE EDITOB,

Sir, — If, on one station there has been a loss of £16,000 in two years, as given in evidence, and if " all the other lessees have a similar melancholy tale to tell," as asserted by the Evening Herald, it is neatly time there was r change of some Bort. It will never do to rllow a)i those enterprising capitalists to disappear, and with them their capital, wbich is so badly wanted just now. They have done their best. I'or seven years they have practised all the "perfect curee," including Mr Baymond's aad the Babbit Act, with the above result, Probably the fatal mietfike was made for want of a better knowledge of the rabbits' natural history, for no 'one jwould have thought them capable of coming 50 miles in a week from the " Government iabbit warrens ; " where them ib always a sufficient reserve to re-stock the low country after the poisoning, yet such is quite likely. Two years »go that £16,000 would have fence') and cleared th&t run; That would have started its owners on the kigh road to fame and fortune before now ; and no doubt, if they could have foreseen events, they would have fenced it and saved their 10,000 sheep and the everlasting. rabbit war. Instead of ibat, they have lost their money, and .New Zealand has lost it too and many more such loe sts with it. The Babbit Department just winks at its wnrrens — causes indirectly the ruin of the pastoral tenants ; thus for consolation and parade it sends them a rabbit in? pector. And all this for £34,000 a year 1 Would not this money be better spent in rabbit proof fencing ? The enhanced rental —after a year or two for recovery might pay interest, and the enhanced prosperity would certainly return tbe caoital in many ways. Yet this most important matter is allowed to jog along in New Zealand, while in Victoria and New South Wales they are systematically fencing. And it says little for our intelligence, that with the longest experience and the greatest prize at stake.we should be making the poorest attempt i.o deal with them effectually. It is not merely a squatter's affair: that the stock are degenerating, because there aiay co*«e fa severe winter that will cause a a* ional calamity by the cracking of bank : and companies, and a general inability to ■ eoover. A winter like 78 would do this, witrca?, with the stock on fostered aress suob a wiuter would be a godsend, for what a clearance there would be in the w»n ens I No doubt our tens of mil ions if rabbits eat « : eome grass" annually, but this will not represent acything like the damage they do, becau ethey must be served flrßt off the seat of everything, while the other stock ban to pat up with *uch inferior food that it causes a degeneration and. paves the way fo 5 disease. In places where do rabbits have been it does a body good to see the luxuriant uasturage and the gr-.at variety of herbs mil graces that were comm n enough oncj but | that are now destroyed through ovt socking. If the expanse is the objection to fencing we should acknowledge it frankly a.A get rid of the " fads " thit are injurious by prolonging the agony. We should, fence experimental block* as least, where an i-tempt conld be made to raiße patches *.f old New Zealand to nee what it could do under reasonable stocking. fiie time would be tho principal 'hin^. The expense of a few aores here and there woul.l be a mere bagatelle compared to the confidence it would give in the event of any comprehensive scheme of fencing being adopted ; and moreever, if intelligently carried out for a series of yeara, those patches might be the means of d; imnstrating an economic cure for this rabbit plague, and a consequent return to prosperity. The smaller the blocks and the larger the amount of country under operation at once the easier it would be to clean it permanently.— l am, &c, Weh£,