116 RODENTS OP IOWA 



Sec. 2348-b. Proofs required. The person catching and killing- 

 any such animal shall remove and present to the officers, before 

 whom he makes his proof, both front feet and claws of each ani- 

 mal for which he claims the bounty, and the person claiming the 

 bounty shall furnish written proof, under oath, that each animal 

 for which he claims the bounty was caught and killed in the county 

 against which he presents the claim for bounty, and the board of 

 supervisors may require in addition to the above any other and 

 further proof which it deems necessary and reasonable to show 

 that each animal for which the bounty is claimed was caught and 

 killed within the county against which the claim is presented. 



Sec. 2348-c. To whom presented. The claws and other proofs 

 icquired may be presented to the county auditor; and the board of 

 supervisors of each county may appoint registrars or other officers 

 in other parts of the county to whom claws of the animal caught 

 and other proofs of the killing may be presented. ' ' 



However, as has been indicated before in this paper, the bounty 

 system as a means of reducing the number of rodent pests is not 

 only unsatisfactory but very expensive. At best, a bounty is but 

 a temporary expedient for checking the increase of the animals, 

 and even if it is made sufficiently large to materially reduce their 

 numbers in a given locality the time soon comes when it becomes 

 no longer profitable to secure the animals for bounty. Seldom, 

 if ever, is a bounty effective in exterminating a noxious animal. 

 With such an animal as the pocket gopher at least, hope of ex- 

 termination by offering bounty is entirely out of the question. 

 Under present conditions it does serve in a measure, to keep down 

 the numbers of the pests even if extraordinary expense is involved. 

 If, on the other hand, cooperative effort towards control measures 

 could be secured along some of the lines that will presently be 

 suggested, vastly better results could much more economically be 

 secured, so that the funds now expended in this attempted control 

 might be diverted into more fruitful channels. North Dakota, 

 California, and other states have successfully carried out this 

 plan and with excellent results. 



Under the bounty system, as at present carried out, various 

 methods of payment by the auditors of different counties are em- 

 ployed, while also the evidence required is somewhat at variance 

 according to the interest taken by the county officials. In two 

 of the sixty-two counties visited the people were virtually given 



