Ill: I WILD LIFE IN NEW ZEALAND. 



warren, poisoning with various baits, and trapping were the 

 methods by which farmers tried to rid themselves of the pest. 

 Later, wire netting, the Introduction of stoats, weasels, and ferrets, 

 fumigating the burrows with poisonous gases (such as carbon 

 disulphide and hydrocyanic acid), and the stimulus given to 

 trapping by the- export trade in fro/en rabbits, have been relied 

 upon to reduce their numbers. In the writer's experience prac- 

 tically no progress was made in reducing the numbers of rabbits 

 till about the year 18!)."). From that year there has been a steadv 

 diminution. For twenty yean the rabbits had the upper hand, 

 and. though many millions were killed annually, no reduction in 

 their abundance was noticeable. In the last twenty years there 

 has been a steady decrease. Large areas of hill country in the 

 wetter districts are now completely clear of rabbits, though they 

 still persist in favourable situations. In the dry country in 

 Central Otago they are still very troublesome and very vigorous, 

 and their evil effects are there seen on hundreds of square miles 

 of country, once the finest grazing-land in Xew Zealand, now little 

 better than a desert." 



It must not be assumed that every one regards the rabbit as a 

 nuisance. Many a successful farmer of to-day got a start as a 

 rabbiter. The killing of rabbits actually became one of the prin- 

 cipal industries of the province. Their presence directly led to 

 the subdivision of large estates, and may have been quite as effective 

 in this direction as all the legislation on the subject. Since tin- 

 war rabbit-skins have become extraordinarily valuable, so that. 

 instead of landholders paying for the destruction of rabbits, 

 rabbiters offer premiums for permission to go on to land to trap 

 the rabbits. 



The introduction of rabbits had a lasting effect on acclimat- 

 i/ation generally. Before their advent partridges and pheasants 

 had become numerous, but they have entirely disappeared in Otago. 

 In the effort to cope with the rabbits the country was annually 

 >wn with poisoned grain. This had a disastrous effect on both 

 native and imported LMIIM-. Had rabbits not become a nui-. 

 it is unlikely that weasels and other vermin would have been in- 

 troduced. These animals are largely responsible for the den 

 in the number- of native birds, and also make the successful intro 

 duct ion of new varieties more difficult. 



