ABSENCE OF NATURAL ENEMIES.

One peculiarity of this colony is the absence of those natural enemies of the rabbit, the presence of which has done so much elsewhere to keep down the nuisance. In Tasmania some of these were valuable auxiliaries, as the weka is near the Waitaki in Otago, but in the greater portion of Southland the only enemy is the hawk, and that will shortly disappear before the application of strychnine and arsenic.

Again, the tax upon dogs is oppressive, and the tax upon powder and shot deterrent.

WANT OF UNITY AND CONTINUITY OF ACTION.

One of the most serious hindrances to success in extermination arises from the absence of unity and continuity of action. There being no compulsion, every leaseholder, freeholder, or occupier does what he likes and when he likes, or does nothing at all. One may be hearty and energetic in his exertions, while his neighbour may be utterly indifferent, breeding by his inaction an abundant supply to replenish the cleared run or holding of the former. Interspersed here and there are Crown lands and other lands, such as educational, municipal, and university, &c., reserves, the rabbit nurseries of the whole country.

Again, though the Provincial Council recognised the presence of so severe a scourge, they withheld that practical recognition of subsidizing local efforts which it is thought the expediency, as well as the justice of the case, demanded. We append two returns showing the alienated and leased lands in pastoral districts, and the sold and unsold land in hundreds, which possibly may be found useful in connection with this point, should the subject be deemed worthy of legislation.

METHODS AT PRESENT ADOPTED TOWARDS EXTERMINATION.

IV. The methods at present adopted towards extermination of the rabbits principally consist of hunting them with dogs on the plains, and shooting and hunting on the edges of bushes and in broken ground. There is very little done in the way of trapping, and that, too, confined to the neighbourhood of homesteads. Poisoning in winter has been tried, but the remedy is one of very doubtful propriety, if not decidedly objectionable; for the poisoned rabbit lying exposed affords a ready sustenance to hawks and those vermin which are the natural enemy of the rabbit. All these efforts combined do not appear to have been attended with any very great success.

METHODS ADOPTED IN OTHER COLONIES.

V. As regards the steps taken by other colonies to arrest the progress of the rabbit nuisance, a memorandum of March last by the Secretary to the Department of Agriculture in Victoria, obligingly forwarded by the Governor, affords the only information that is available regarding the prevalence of the rabbit nuisance in that colony. From this it appears that the nuisance has prevailed, more or less, since the first introduction of the rabbit near Geelong many years ago, so that at the present moment there is hardly a part of Victoria where it is not to be found. No public steps have been taken to avert the evil, though privately much has been done with varied success. The rapidity with which the rabbit breeds in Victoria bids defiance to the ordinary methods followed in England of shooting, ferreting, and trapping. Mr. Robertson, of Colac, appears to have been the most successful; but at an expense quite beyond adoption in this colony. Finding that the rabbits had taken possession of numerous wombat holes near Warrion Hill, living in communities, not in families merely, he endeavoured to exterminate them by filling up the holes with basalt boulders; but fruitlessly, for the rabbits burrowed out of the sides, and were as numerous as ever. He then removed the soil until he reached the underlying basaltic rock itself, and built in the rabbits with solid masonry; and not till this was done did he succeed, and then only at the sacrifice of 10,000 acres of his best land, and £35,000 expended during the seven years occupied in the undertaking. The freehold estate is said to amount to 25,000 acres.

The colony of Tasmania appears to be in many respects, as regards the question under consideration, not unlike that of New Zealand, and may afford us some useful lessons. The evidence taken by the Select Committee of the Provincial Council of Otago informs us that the general character of the colony is hilly, wooded, and broken. Prior to 1869 the rabbit was known to exist there, but as its natural enemies, tiger cats, devils, eagle hawks, and wild domestic cats were numerous, the evil was insignificant; but many of these vermin being destructive to lambs, they were destroyed in vast numbers; while in 1869 the wild domestic cat was seized with a fatal disease, and almost entirely extirpated. Since then, and in consequence of the diminution of their natural enemies, the rabbits appear to have taken full possession of several parts of the country, so much so as to necessitate action on the part of the legislature.

Before submitting a concise sketch of this legislation, obligingly furnished by the Governor, it may be desirable to state that the Colonial Secretary, in a memorandum of the 26th March last, observes: “That “the operation of the laws in force for the destruction “of rabbits has on the whole proved of great service “in keeping under this serious scourge to the farmer; “but it requires united action, and the cordial co-“operation of all the infested localities, to secure “practical results of a durable character.”

“The Rabbits Destruction Act” became law at the close of 1871, and was to continue in operation until the end of the first session of 1874, and no longer. In September, 1874, it was slightly amended, and given a further currency to the 31st December, 1877, and again in September, 1875, additional powers were given as to altering and re-defining districts. As these three Acts, and the “Cross and Bye-Roads Act, 1870,” are appended to this Report, it will be sufficient to say that a Rabbit District may be proclaimed on the petition of not less than ten persons, being land owners under the Act, should, not a counter petition be presented by landholders in the same district, having a greater number of votes. Powers are given for the election of trustees, who are thereby enabled to impose a rate to the extent of one shilling in the pound in any one year of the annual value of the property in the district, the occupier of Crown land, under lease or license, paying only one-half of any rate. In case of a landholder neglecting or refusing to destroy the rabbits on his property, the trustees may enter upon such lands for the purposes of the Act; and further, may enter to search for rabbits. Accompanying these Acts, and also appended hereto, is a statement by Mr. Latham, Council Clerk and Secretary to the Rabbit Trust. The Hamilton Rabbit District was constituted in April, 1872, and the landholders elected trustees, who proceeded to levy a rate, and appointed one of their number in each section of their district to purchase skins. These skins were paid for by the trustees monthly, after audit. In three years there was a sum of ninepence in the pound, raised by rates, 347,860 rabbits were killed, and their skins sold, and the proceeds of the sale, together with the rates, left only a very few pounds to the debit of the trust. The skins must be perfectly dry when purchased, sprinkled with diluted carbolic acid on the fleshy side, to prevent the ravages of the weevil, which vermin reduces the value of the skin one-half, and then the skins should be carefully packed in bales and sold.