938 



Council of Agriculture. 



[Jan., 



\vhatever in farming and who allowed rabbits to increase unduly. 

 He would strongly deprecate legislation which would allovv^ a 

 tenant farmer to enter woods abutting his farm in order to 

 destroy rabbits, but it ought to be possible with the help of 

 .agricultural Committees to frame regulations which would 

 prevent such persons as he had described from being a real 

 (i anger to farming property. 



Mr. McCracken thought Eailway Companies were great 

 offenders and Mr. Donaldson supported the motion as one who 

 had suffered from the depredations of the vermin. Mr. Acland 

 f-aid that in cases in Devonshire and Somerset which he knew, 

 it was the landlord who was trying to put the rabbits down and 

 the farmer who was trying to keep them up. He found that the 

 increase of rabbits on his own property had enormously added 

 to the expense of planting trees on account of the wire netting 

 required. He thought the resolution a good one and deplored 

 rhe fact that farmers frequently prefeiTed sixpenny worth of sport 

 ro £6 of damage done by rabbits. 



The Minister said that he fully realised the great damage 

 done by rabbits and vermin. If the Council passed this resolu- 

 tion, the only way it could be carried out would be by legisla- 

 tion. He would be quite prepared, so far as he was concerned » 

 to see that the legislation v.as introduced, but it would have 

 to be quite clear that any money required to make it effective 

 could not be found by the Treasury. A Babbits Officer would 

 appear to be required. He would ask the Council how the 

 legislation would be earned out. The Cultivations Committee 

 used to have a considerable staff of officers, but nearly all that 

 staff had been disbanded. They did not want to see such an 

 Act as was proposed become a dead letter, and it could only 

 !)e prevented from becoming so by the expenditure of money. 

 Would those who nov>^ supported this proposal also support in 

 their respective Local Councils the expenditure of sufficient 

 money to carry out the provisions of an Act? 



Mr. Bruford suggested that the members of xigiicultural Com- 

 mittees could deal with the matter voluntarily, or that the 

 (bounty Band Agents could take it in the course of their ordinary 

 ^vork. He did not think the County Councils would object to 

 expending the small amount of money required. Mr. CP. Hall 

 and Mr. Hav/k considered that means could be taken by which 

 the cost would become negligible. Mr. Colin Campbell agreed 

 with this view and Major Courthope, M.P., suggested that 

 the jurisdiction of Petty Sessional Courts might be used without 

 the appointing of any additional officers. He thought that the 



