108 YEARBOOK OF THE DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE. 



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wliich may cause incalculable harm? Experience with the English 

 sparrow, the work of rabbits in Australia and of the mongoose in 

 Jamaica, all these have abundantly shown the necessity of preventing 

 the repetition of similar costly blunders in the future. 



Twelve years ago Dr. C. Hart Merriam, Chief of the Biological 

 Survey, urged tlie necessity of restricting the importation of exotic 

 species, as follows : ^ 



It seems desirable that a law be enacted conferring npon the Commissioner 

 [Secretary] of Agriculture the power of granting or withholding permits for the 

 importation of birds and mammals, except in the case of domesticated species, 

 certain song and cage birds (to be specifically enumerated), and species intended 

 for exhibition in zoological gardens, menageries, and museums, which may be 

 brought in without special permits. The question of the desirability of importing 

 species of known beneficial qualities in other lands is one which sooner or later 

 must force itself upon our notice: and it is highly important that when such 

 experiments are made they should be conducted by or under the control of the 

 Department of Agriculture. 



Ten years later Mr. Alexander Craw, quarantine ofiicer of the Cali- 

 fornia State board of horticulture, again called attention to the need 

 of legislation, and in his annual report for 1896 recommended the pas- 

 sage b.y Congress of a stringent law preventing the introduction of 

 noxious animals. 



At present there is no Federal statute on the subject, and api^ar- 

 ently California is the only State which has given the matter serious 

 attention or has taken steps to prevent thoughtless or intentional 

 importation of injurious species. In the act creating the State board 

 of horticulture, approved March 13, 1883, and amended March 8, 1889, 

 authority was conferred on the board to make regulations for the pur- 

 pose of preventing the spread of fruit pests. In accordance with this 

 act, certain quarantine regulations were adopted on August 15, 1894, 

 one of which. Rule XII, provides that "animals known as flying fox, 

 Australian or English wild rabbit, or other animals or birds detri- 

 mental to fruit or fruit trees, plants, etc., are prohibited froui being 

 brought or landed in this State, and if brought, they shall be 

 destroyed. "2 This law has resulted in the destruction of several 

 flying foxes and, so far as known, every mongoose thus far brought to 

 the i^ort of San Francisco. It is, perhaj^s, not too much to saj" that 

 to this regulation and to the vigilance of the quarantine officer at San 

 Francisco the State owes its present freedom from the mongoose. 



The action of Cape Colony and Western Australia on this question 

 stands out in marked contrast to the apathy of other countries. Cape 

 Colony, in 1800, nuide it unlawful to introduce rabbits, either by land 

 or sea, oi- to turn them loose within the colony;^ required the rabbits 



•Annual Report Department of Agriculture for 1886, p. 258. 

 ■^ Fifth Biennial Report State Board of Horticulture, 1890, p. 8. 

 'Under a penalty not exceeding 5 pounds for first offense or 10 pounds for sec- 

 ond offense. (See Agr. Journ., Cape Town, III, January 8, 1891, p. 119.) 



