Rabbit Boards "Must Have Realistic Goal”

Press, Volume CVI, Issue 31107, 9 July 1966, Page 19

Rabbit Boards "Must Have Realistic Goal”

(From Our Own Reporter)

TIMARU, July 8.

Rabbit boards must have a realistic goal, otherwise they would be faced with apathy, the director of the Tussock Grasslands and Mountain Lands Institute (Dr. S. N. Adams) told the South Island Rabbit Boards’ Association conference in Timaru.

Dr. Adams said the boards must take a certain area and try to prove whether eradication was possible. “See if you can put two or three boards out of business,” he said. “If you can’t eradicate, then you must decide what your budget is going to be for control. If you have an unrealistic goal, you will inevitably have apathy.” Dr. Adams was one of a, panel of seven who discussed the question: “Because of complacency and lack of interest within the farming community, how great is the danger of the rabbit again becoming a menace?” Asked by the president (Mr C. C. S. Parker) what prospects scientists could hold out. Dr. Adams said a scientist must first have a problem, but if eradication was considered possible, was there a problem? Dr. Adams said it was rather discouraging to a scien-

> tist to be the subject of perl sonal attacks when he pre- • sented a report. When a Fuli bright scholar visited New ; Zealand and gave his views ’ on noxious animal control, he i was personally attacked. In ■ such circumstances, a scien- . tist was likely to decide to : do something else. i Mr G. B. Baker, a former chairman of the Rabbit Dei struction Council, said the ! goal must be eradication, not ' control. “We have had ‘con- • trol’ for a number of years, ; and the situation is static,” he said. “Complacency” “There is tremendous complacency by ratepayers, and even by some board members. You have got to get the co-operation of ratepayers. You can obtain a subsidy for all work done on farms. “I suggest you start by charging £1 for every rabbit caught on farm property. You will soon get co-operation.”

Mr Baker said he though, the matter was a human problem, not an animal problem.

“It is the complacent, un-co-operative, and indolent farmer who is being subsidised by the State. I know of one man who, when approached by a board foreman and asked whether he had seen any rabbits, said: ‘You are paid by the board. Go and find out.’ That came from a man who was once near ruin through rabbits. I say, charge these farmers a flat rate for getting the rabbits.” Mr Baker said his remarks on co-operation were not directed to high-country farmers. The co-operation there had been first-class. High-Country View

Mr P. C. Ensor, representing the high-country section of Federated Farmers, said that, by and large, rabbits were not an economic problem so far as production was concerned, but they were an economic problem to the State and the individual. “If total eradication is not possible, then we must determine the tolerance we can accept, which is the outlook of a lot of farmers at the moment,” he said. Mr W. H. Smith, of the Department of Agriculture, said he thought ground cover, such as gorse in river-beds, would have to be cleared to achieve eradication. If £1 a rabbit was charged, many farmers would abandon their river frontages, and, in a place like the Rangitata river-bed, increase the area of unoccupied land from 12,000 acres to about 20,000 acres.

Mr Baker did not think ground cover was such' a problem, because some of the worst-infested areas in the past, he said, were open tussock hillsides, such as in Otago.