40 JACK. lUBBlTS or THE UNITED STATES. 



BOUNTIES. 



Bounties have been paid on jack rabbits in five of the Western 

 States — California, Idaho, Oregon, Texas, and Utah — but the amounts 

 have been small as compared with similar expenditures for the destruc- 

 tion of other animals. In Oregon, Texas, and Utah the rates were 

 fixed by State laws, but in California the bounties varied in different 

 counties. Bounties on rabbits have been even less successful, so far 

 as extermination is concerned, than those offered for coyotes, prairie 

 dogs, pocket gophers, or ground squirrels. 



CALIFORNIA. 



One the main objects of bounties in California, particularly those 

 offered by the counties in the San Joaquin Valley, was to encourage 

 rabbit drives, and in some cases the payments were almost sufiicient 

 to defray such expenses. Eight counties have offered bounties during 

 recent years, namely, Butte, Colusa, Fresno, Modoc, San Bernardino, 

 Shasta, Sutter, and Tulare. In the case of Sutter County, and possibly 

 one or two others, the returns include amounts expended for pocket 

 gophers and ground squirrels. Bounties are seldom offered on rabbits 

 aloue, and it is difficult to obtain the amounts expended for each 

 species. 



A rate of 10 cents per scalp was paid both by Butte and Colusa 

 counties — the highest rate paid for any considerable length of time. 

 In Butte County it was maintained from January 7, 1887, to February 

 1, 1890; in Colusa, from February 10, 1888, to September 12, 1802. The 

 bounty was then reduced to 4 cents and continued to February 1, 1894. 



In Fresno the bounty was offered merely to defray the expenses of 

 the rabbit drives, and was not i)aid unless at least 1,000 pairs of ears 

 were presented at one time. The total amount expended was about 

 $500, indicating that more than 33,000 scalps were received. 



In the spring of 1880 the supervisors of Modoc County ottered 3 

 cents apiece for rabbit scalps, and in three months expended $826.77 

 for 27,559 scalps.' 



The bounty offered by San Bernardino County about two years after 

 the passage of the coyote scalp act of 1891, is uniijuefrom the fact that 

 its main object was to offset the effect of the State bounty on coyotes. 

 The ordinance went into etfect August 25, 1893, and expfred by limita- 

 tion on December of the same year. It jnovided that the rabbits 

 must be killed within 2 miles of a cultivated orchard, nursery, vineyard, 

 or alfalfa field not less than 1 acre in extent, and the scalps must be 

 deposited within thirty days with a justice of the peace of the town- 

 ship in which the animals were killed. 



Tulare County expended $5,000 for bounties on ground s(iuirrels 

 previous to November 1894, besides paying $3,000 for bounties on rab- 



' Forest and Stieaui, XXVil, August 5, 1886, p. 26, 



