236 ANIMALS OF THE PAST 



eighteen months the State was called upon to 

 pay out $187,485. As a result of the war on 

 coyotes the animals on which they fed, notably 

 the rabbits, increased so enormously that in 

 turn a bounty was put on rabbits, the damage 

 these animals caused the fruit-growers being 

 greater than the losses among sheep-owners 

 from the depredations of coyotes. And so, 

 says Dr. l*almer, " In this remarkable case 

 of legislation a large bounty was offered by a 

 county in the interest of fruit-growers to coun- 

 teract the effects of a State bounty expended 

 mainly for the benefit of sheep-owners ! " 



Professor Shaler, in noting the sudden dis- 

 appearance of such trees as the gums, magno- 

 lias, and tulip poplars from the JNliocene flora 

 of Europe has suggested that this may have 

 been due to the attacks, for a series of years, 

 of some insect enemy like the gipsy moth, and 

 tlie theory is worth considering, although it 

 must be looked upon as a possibility rather 

 than a probability. Still, anyone familiar with 

 the ravages of the gipsy moth in Massachu- 

 setts, where the insect was introduced by ac- 

 cident, can readily imagine what might have 



