THE PLAGUE OF FIELD VOLES IN SCOTLAND. 127 



to have been well nigh inappreciable. The Committee are not 

 prepared to declare that landowners and farmers could have 

 arrested the plague, but they hold a very strong opinion that the 

 best chance of averting its disastrous effects would have been for 

 all interested in the ownership and occupation of land to have 

 combined for the destruction of the voles when they were first 

 observed to increase. 



Burning bog land, bent, and heather, seem to be effective in 

 driving the voles off the portions burnt. Mr. Carthew Yorstoun, 

 Commissioner on the Duke of Buccleuch's Langholm estate, 

 stated that he had written to every tenant of a hill-farm in 1892, 

 asking if an extension of the time for burning would be an 

 advantage. Three-fourths of those written to replied in the 

 affirmative, and received permission to burn from 14th April (the 

 usual limit) to 28th. The remaining fourth said they had already 

 burned as much as the ground would stand. It is not profitable 

 to burn all the rough pasture on a farm, as the sheep depend on 

 it fur sustenance when snow is on the ground. 



Poison has been tried with very partial success. Samples 

 of grain treated, with strychnine, and coloured red to prevent 

 mistakes, were supplied from Germany and submitted. It is 

 stated that good results were obtained with this in limited areas ; 

 for instance, the tenant of Middlegill, near Moffat, holding a farm 

 of 3000 acres, applied this poison to a meadow of ten acres, and 

 thereby partly destroyed the voles. Sir Walter Elliot quoted a 

 letter from Sir Robert Menzies, who describes how he got rid of 

 the voles which infested 140 acres of Scots fir-plantation, by 

 laying down half a ton of half-inch drain pipes, in each of which 

 was placed a teaspoonful of oatmeal mixed with phosphorus. 

 But, for obvious reasons, the application of poisoned grain 

 over hill-farms, extending to many thousands of acres, even if 

 practicable, would be attended with much risk to other forms 

 of life. 



Pitfalls — i. e., holes cut in the ground with precipitous sides — 

 are equally out of the question when a large tract of country has 

 to be dealt with. But they have proved effectual when plantations 

 of limited extent have been attacked. The forester at Branx- 

 holm within a week exterminated the voles infesting a plantation 

 of six acres, by digging pits 12 inches wide at the mouth, 15 in. 

 wide at the bottom, and 18 in. deep. These were placed at a 



