A PLAGUE OF DOGS RATS, AND RABBITS.

Dunstan Times, Issue 1184, 7 November 1884, Page 4

A PLAGUE OF DOGS RATS, AND RABBITS.

The plagte of rabbits in onr Australasian •colonies is one of which much has been heard, and it appears that another European animal, the ■"dog, is about to follow the example of the rabbit, and make himself a pest instead of a pet. It appears that the number of -wild or semi wild dogs has 'recently increased largely in Victoria •and New South Wales, and the conse«quence is a great slaughter of sheep by •tire nomads. The Government has •already offered rewards for their destruction, In New Zealand some en•terprising people have hit on the idea •df importing weasels and stoats from England to keep down the rabbits ; that -if the former increase in their new Tiabitatas rapidly as the latter have ‘done, the last state of New Zealand '■will be worse than the first, for a pla;gue of rabbits must be as nothing com spared with a plague of weasels, and a .great increase of the latter, from their predatory and destructive habits must •be followed **y a considerable alteration in the distribution of the fauna -of New Zealand. In Jamaica, according to the last report of the Director -Of Public Gardens in that Colony, the planters suffered great y from the depredations ot rats among the sugar -canes. The rat eaten canes were good •ffor nothing except rum, and accordingly large sums were spent in poison and • clogs to keep the rats down, but apparently without much success. At •last an enterprising planter determined ‘to import the mongoose from India •to destroy tlie rats on the sugai ■estates. The sugar planters, Mr Morris says, have unquestionably ■benefited greatly by its introduction, ■and rat eaten canes are now hardly iinown where formerly they were ; found in large quantities. But the ■ new importations continues to multiply ••and spread not only on sugar estates, ‘but on the highest mountains, as well • as along shoro, even amid the swamps ■and lagoons ; and when the sugarcane rat is wholly exterminated, the mongoose will still go on increasing, and what then! Must the colonists find •something else to exterminate the •Mongoose, and save the poultry, and so •on “ad infinitum ” ? As it is negro •settlers and persons not connected with sugar estates complain of its •ravages amongst theii poultry, and -even accuse it of destroying fruit and ■vegetables ; and, although Mr Morris •■doubts whether these complaints are ••ail wellfounded, he acknowledges that ‘the 1 mongoose is the cause of great •disturbance in the animal life of Jamacia. Harmless, yellow, and other •• snakes, lizards, ground-hatching birds, 'rabbits and many members of indigenous fauna of the island are likely ‘to become extinct at no distant date. -Tt will be interesting to watch the -effect of the inti eduction of the mon* •rgoose, and we hope Mr Moms will "enlighten us from year to,year on the — Nature.