DECREASE OF ANIMAL LIFE 369 



of some beasts and birds of prey, and certainly of the Badger, 

 as the active measures which have been taken against them 

 by man on account of their depredations. In newly settled 

 countries cause and effect are more easily traced. Before the 

 settlers reached California from the east, the "Jack- Rabbit" 

 (Lepus texianus] swarmed in fertile valleys and plains. In the 

 earlier settlement days it proved so serious a menace to the 

 crops that rabbit-drives on a large scale became a feature of 

 western life. At a single drive in 1896 in Fresno, 20,000 

 " Rabbits" were slain. Twenty years pass, and we learn from 

 the American Museum Journal '(Jan. 1917) that the custom is 

 forgotten. Partly owing to the warfare against them, but also 

 in great degree to the advance of cultivation, the "Rabbits" 

 have been driven from the cultivated grounds to the rough 

 uncultivated foothills ; for several thousands of orchards and 

 vineyards, market gardens and dairies have replaced the 

 grain-fields of the comparatively few and large farms of a 

 quarter of a century ago. 



With the breaking in of the wild banks and braes "the 

 burnin' yellow's awa that was aince a-lowe, On the braes o' 

 whin " the nesting sites for many small birds and shelter 

 for many small rodents and insectivores have disappeared, 

 to the grievous reduction of their kinds. 



It is not easy to lay to its charge all the evil influences 

 cultivation has exercised upon wild animal life. Its ways of 

 working are many and subtle. Take, for example, the case 

 of the disappearance. of Butterflies. 



"Account for it as we may," says Mr William Evans in his Fauna of the 

 Forth, " there is abundant evidence that butterflies were formerly more 

 plentiful in the district [of "Forth"] than they are now; indeed we seem to 

 have lost quite a number of species in the course of the last century. In the 

 older lists, we find Vanessa c -album 1 , Pararge megara*, Pamphila tinea 3 , and 

 Pamphila silvanus*, all of which must have vanished long ago, and I fear the 

 Orange-tip, Peacock, Speckled Wood, and Ringlet species I used to get in 

 the Lothians when a boy but never see now have gone also." 



Cultivation is probably the culprit ; the wild food plant of 

 the caterpillar has been destroyed in the old haunts, shelter- 

 ing hedgerows have been removed, the dust and grime of 

 towns and traffic have rendered existence impossible. Even 

 where the final stage, extermination, has not been reached, 



1 Comma Butterfly. 2 Wall B. 



3 Small Skipper B. 4 Large Skipper B. 



