The Rabbit-Cat Alliance.

Wairarapa Standard, Volume XIX, Issue 1870, 13 August 1886, Page 2

The Rabbit-Cat Alliance.

The rabbit pest is certainly bad enough, an,j various means have been devised iu the effort to stamp it out. Stoats, weasels, ferrets, .mongooses, and, lastly—oats—have been all brought into service in turn in order to tackle iwith ” the bunny nuisance.” We fear, however, that the ” oat ” experiment may possibly result in the production of a plague far worse than the original rabbit pest. In looking over onr Melbourne files we were appalled in coming across the following paragraph published in a Victorian country paper. Here it is;— “ We have been shown two extraordinary prodigies of nature. They are the progeny of a oat and a black rabbit, the latter being the male. The head, forefeet, and half of the bodies of each animal partake of the cat, while the other quarters resemble the rabbit, even to its fur, the fore part having the coarser hair of the maternal pareut. These ourlons looking animals, which were born on a farm of Mr Rankin about ten months ago, are a male aud female, and are full grown. They are very docile, and are in the habit of following Mrs Rankin about the paddocks. £-i bey eat grans with as much gusto as they

would a mouse. The animals have been secured by Mr Thornes Turner, who contemplates showing them through the colonies, after which they will be transhipped to the Surrey Zoological Gardens in England.” Now here is a pretty state of affairs to which we call the instant attention of Mr Bayly, the Babbit Inspector, the Babbit Committee, and, finally, our old friend, Mr Coleman Phillips, who has always been foremost in devising means to keep down the rabbit pest. We ask those gentlemen to lay their heads together and devise some measures to save the Wairarapa district from the possible terrible results which may ensue if the masculine rabbits in the district take to marrying the famine cats. Just think of it. We should then have an abundant breed of “ eat-rabbits ” or “ rabbit-cats,” which would possess all the evil qualities of both theirj paternal and maternal progenitors. These new and terrible “ varmints ” would uu doubt steal and eat meat, kill birds, and lap up milk and cream ; but also go in for any amount of destruction of growing crops, and be able to eat up every green thing and leave a grass paddock as bare as a turnpike road. Certainly, the rabbit pest has been a sore infliction upon the settlers, but should they be visited with the “ rabbit-cum-cat ” plague the thing will get beyond endurance. Let us hope that the great rabbit and cat families in the Wairarapa will never, as in Victoria, contrast any matrimonial alliance.