DESTROYING RABBITS 227 



on a fine summer night the trio, at dark, commence operations. 

 The gate is opened and fastened back, a large net is extended 

 across the gateway, with the lower edge lying on the ground about 

 6 in. on the field side. The men, one on each end of the net, 

 but on opposite sides and ends, start the dog to work, as it does 

 zigzag, round the field, and probably returns to the starting-point 

 blank, when it turns, still keeping round the field on new ground, 

 covering it all by in-and-out trotting about as wide as in the first 

 journey, until at length a hare is found. The dog then puts up 

 the hare, making no attempt to catch it, for all its efforts are 

 directed towards driving it into the net by preventing its escape 

 by gaps in the hedge. Finally, the hare makes a rush for the gate 

 and is caught in the net, and before giving cry is seized and bagged 

 by the " liers " in wait. 



DESTROYING RABBITS. As well known, rabbits live in small 

 colonies, each of which consists of one or more families. These 

 colonies are broken up in winter, preparatory to the breeding 

 season, and are afterwards re-formed by the does that were in 

 the colony before the winter, each family remaining near its birth- 

 place, and thus the colony is reinstated in its old quarters ; but 

 if fresh members, and thus becoming over-populated, they migrate, 

 and then only in part, to some more suitable spot. 



In the spring time rabbits lie almost exclusively in coverts, 

 hedges, and banks, always feeding close to them, the females only 

 leaving them for a time, when they make " nests " separate from 

 the burrows, either in open fields or in coverts, and as soon as the 

 young are old enough they are removed to hedges or other shelter- 

 ing places. In summer rabbits spend much of their time in the 

 open air making " seats," but always near their burrows, and 

 delight in coverts and open copses and brakes. In autumn their 

 days are spent in hedges, plantations, stubbles, furzy and grassy 

 places, as well as woods with tussocks and undergrowth relatively 

 open. In winter rabbits occupy the warmest burrows existing 

 or that may be made, usually in a bank and at the roots of trees, 

 when they generally live in pairs or threes, commonly a buck and 

 one or two does, or else all does, or a single buck. 



Spring is the real breeding time of rabbits, and unless then doing 

 serious damage to growing crops, they are not destroyed, as this 

 would mean a great sacrifice of human food. But when the rabbits 

 have their abodes round a field of corn, or other crop liable to be 

 eaten right away, there is nothing for it but to either exclude them 

 by netting or kill them. This is best done by trapping, but very 

 often this is difficult to carry out, as the hedge and bank may 

 belong to the covert, the neighbouring landowner or tenant. The 

 rabbit taking up its abode in a hedge commences to burrow, scratch- 

 ing out the earth close to the ground, and on this heap is the place 

 to set a trap. If rabbits are in the hedge there will be a track up 



