mode of preventing them. 437 



and preventing their working, tin ones of the same sort Were sub- 

 stituted and answered very well, catching great numbers. They 

 were however superseded by the trenches or holes, which were 

 cheaper and succeeded better. 



5. The plan of the holes which has answered so well, was first 

 suggested by a man of the name of Simmonds, a professed Rat- 

 catcher, who having been employed to catch the Mice, had ob- 

 served, on going to work in the morning, that some of them had 

 fallen into wells, or pits, accidentally formed, and could not get 

 out again ; many of them dying from hunger or fatigue in endea- 

 vouring to climb up the sides. Such pits were therefore on his 

 recommendation immediately tried. They were at first made 

 three feet deep, three long, and two wide ; but these were found 

 to be unnecessarily large, and, after various experiments, it ap- 

 peared that they answered best when from eighteen to twenty 

 inches deep at the bottom, about two feet in length, and one foot 

 and a half in width, and, at top, only eighteen inches long and 

 nine wide, or indeed as small as the earth could be got out of a 

 hole of that depth ; for the wider they are below, and the nar- 

 rower above, the better they answer their purpose. They were 

 made twenty yards asunder, or about twelve on an acre ; or, when 

 the Mice m ere less numerous, thirty yards apart. 



Nearly 30,000 Mice had been caught, principally by this last 

 method, in Dean Forest, up to the 22d of December last, and 

 Mr. Davies is convinced that a far greater number have been 

 taken out of the holes, either alive or dead, by Stoats, Weazels, 

 Kites, Owls, &c. and even by Crows, Magpies, Jays, &c. The 

 success of these holes in Dean Forest, has been so great, that the 

 use of a bait in them was soon discontinued ; but, from an inac- 

 curacy in the digging of them, or some other cause, they have been 

 far less cliicacious in i^iGw Forest, where the Mice continue still, 

 though less numerous now, to infest our plantations. 



It was hoped, that the late severe weather would have cither 

 totally destroyed, or greatly diminished the numbers of these 

 animals, for they did not venture out during the hard frosts. In 

 u letter from Air. Davies, dated the Stii of March, 1814, he gives 

 only 1,24G as the number taken from 7lh January to the 5th 



