RABBIT CONTROL

Wairarapa Times-Age, 7 April 1938, Page 9

RABBIT CONTROL

PRINCIPLE OF BOARD APPROVED MEETING OF MASTERTON The principle of the establishment of a rabbit board was approved at a largely attended meeting of district farmers, held yesterday afternoon in Masterton. The proposal met with a certain amount of opposition, a section of the meeting being of the opinion that far better results could be obtained by leaving the work of combating the pests to individual farmers. On the other hand, it was pointed out by the chairman, Mr A. H. Falloon, and others, that farmers were not getting anywhere under the present system of rabbit inspection and eradication.

After an extended discussion, in the course of which Mr W. B. Manning, principal inspector to the Live Stock Department, gave much helpful advice, a motion approving of the principle of the establishment of a rabbit board was carried by 23 votes to 15.

Opinions were fairly sharply divided as to what area the proposed board should embrace. The original proposal was to include an area of 120,000 acres, but the concensus of opinion at the meeting was that a considerably larger area should be embraced and that the whole of the district from Eketahuna to Cape Palliscr could be controlled just as economically as the 120,000 acres.

It was eventually decided to invite the Eketahuna, Mauriceville, Castlepoint, Masterton. South Wairarapa and Featherston counties to send delegates, with power to vote, to decide whether the areas they controlled should be brought within the scope of the board’s activities.