170 Practical Game Preserving. 



length of its days shortened, the rabbit lives under exactly 

 similar conditions as it would were it permitted to " run 

 wild." This class of warren may vary in extent from a 

 small wood or copse to five or six hundred acres, and may 

 have all the prominent features of a farm, except the crops, 

 which, it need scarcely be mentioned, would stand a poor 

 chance were agriculture and rabbit rearing attempted simul- 

 taneously. We have over and over again seen estates 

 of such a nature, rough and unserviceable, which would 

 make most excellent warrens estates on which copse and 

 wood, common and broken moor, alternated with unpro- 

 ductive fields and sterile meadows in most excellent irregu- 

 larity that is, for the purpose of which we speak but 

 for farms were of no worth at all. Such as these are the very 

 places where a large warren could be organised with every 

 prospect of success, and with but little outlay. No one but 

 those who know can conceive how quickly rabbits will 

 increase, and adapt themselves to such a place ; nor would 

 anyone imagine the number which could in a year or two find 

 good shelter and satisfactory existence upon land apparently 

 incapable of supporting a score or two of sheep. One 

 proviso, however, is that there must be a fair proportion 

 of plantation or copse, with a thick substantial undergrowth. 

 An estate of this nature would in winter become almost 

 a wilderness a weather-beaten, desolate expanse and such 

 being the case, good shelter at that time for the breeding 

 stock and in spring for the young would be obligatory, not- 

 withstanding heavy extra feeding and the frequent bestowal x 

 of comforts. Warmth is life to rabbits in winter, and 

 although one finds many a skinny, almost skeleton-like 



