PLAGUE OF RATS IN EAST LOTHIAN.

Temuka Leader, Issue 2029, 5 April 1890, Page 3

PLAGUE OF RATS IN EAST LOTHIAN.

One of the principal topics engaging attention in the Edinburgh newspapers during the past month has been a plague of rats with which East Lothian in particular is afflicted, though the rodents are also giving some trouble in other parts. They have inflicted great damage upon the turnip and potatoe crops, have barked trees, have riddled hedgerows, and undermined footpaths with their holes, while in some parts it has become unsafe for pedestrians to g® along the roads at night. The causes to which the plague are attributed are, mainly, the open winter, and the destruction of hawks, owls, and weasels, together with the deportation of many of the last-named to New Zealand. The farmers in the country have held meetings to consider what should be done, and many highly interesting and entertaining letters on the subject have been published in the papers, In spite of some difference of opinion as to the ability of weasels to cope with full-grown rats, their usefulness as rat-killers seems established. It is also admitted that owls kill many young rats, but the efficiency of cats, while warmly advocated by some, is as keenly disputed by others. One correspondent says a good word for pussyon the strength of experience of her rat-killing powers in the Dunstan district of Otago and on the West Coast goldfields. On the whole it seems likely that the farmers will make a united attack on the rats with dogsj ferrets, and poison; but they are angry that the gamekeepers neutralise their efforts to a considerable extent by continuing to kill weasels, cats, and birds of prey. They say, and probably with truth, that the rats are doing more depredation among game than their natural enemies ever did, but gamekeepers are difficult to convince, as everyone knows. Shoals of letters have been received from all parts of the country from persons interested in rats, Some offer their services and those of their dogs, one man offering his gratnitiously, “for the fun of the thing,” saying he “ would be in heaven among all those rats.” Others offer poisons deadly to rats only, and so on. Meanwhile the rat’s reputation as a redoubtable foe to both man and beast has been very fully established; and if it is true, as has been stated, that “ a single rat will multiply into over 900 or thereby in a year,” it is clear that farmers and game preservers in East Lothian have their work out out for them. Meanwhile they are setting to at the work of vat-killing with great energy, and at a meeting held last week in the Corn Exchange at Haddington to confer on the subject, the reports given in were considered satisfactory, so far as the campaign had gone.