CATS FOR SHEEP-RUN

Marlborough Express, Volume LXXVI, Issue 248, 21 October 1942, Page 5

CATS FOR SHEEP-RUN

COMMENT BY MINISTER. C'ommenting at Wellington that an Alexandra runholder had ofifered to buy 500 cats at 4s a head to help rid his land . of rabbits, the Minister for Internal Affairs, Mr Parry, said if the runholder carried out his plan with the cats it would be a poor reward to that large body of men and women of the Dominion who had along hiany years vied with. one another in efforts to protect New Zealand 's native birds. Protection of stoats and weasels, he said, had been removed and a price fixed for those animals and other vermin killed expressly with the object of saving the country's much-prized bird life. Any dweller in the country where there was native bush was able, he said, to testify to the extent to which domestic cats, turned loose to become wild, attacked the native birds. The toll made by wild cats on birds was so consider able to-day that fields cfficers of State departments had been instructed ta shoot the pests, by which designation they could alone be classified. "With all bird-lovers," Mr Parry added, "I appeal to the Alexandra runholder to adopt not cats, but one or all of the other well-known methods of ridding his land of rabbits. I feel he will realise the value and the asset native birds are to the country."