, 1912-01-27

&c, &c, &c,
2Stl November, 1911.
BARBADOS.
Aay 1t please Your EGceWency.
We the Commissioners appointed under q
Com mission dated 25th September, 1911, to
take evidence with a view TO determining III
what districts of the Island rats have in
creased and are damaging the cane crops,
and to take such steps as may be necessary
to ensure that a proper number of mongooses
be sent from those districts to q person to
be appointed to examine the contents of the
stomachs of one hundred mongooses with q
view to ascertain whether they are of much
use IN the destruction of rats, have the hon
our to submit the following report -
2. The Commission have held five meet
ings and have examined thirty witnesses.
The evidence obtained from them will be
found in the Appendix to this report.
3. 1t is a fact that before the intl oduc-
tion of the ~mongoose there was great and
wide spread damage done by rats to the crop
in all parts of the Island, and it is equally
true that since its Introduction, until within
the last two years, the damage SO caused has
been nc0nsideIable
4. From the evidence OF Inc witnesses
from the Parishes of St. Thomas, ST. John,
ST. Joseph and st. Andrew, we find that
JL0I6 uGkS DCCd u SICdG III Tx JUN
Der of rat eaten canes i'll certain parts of
those parishes during the last two years. to q
greater extent in the three latter than in st.
Thomas; and that the cause of this increase
is the destruction of the mongoose. The
evidence Old this point is, in our opinion,
conclusive. On referring to the return i'll
the Appendix to this report it will be proved
that of the 1885 mongooses destroyed in
ten of the parishes IAN area Of about $50
square miles, none having been destroyed in
St Michael), since the coming into opera
ton Of the Mongoose Destruction Act, 2,226
were destroy ed i'll St. Thomas, 6,O84 in st.
John, II, 576 in st. Joseph and II, 500 in st.
Andrew,--a total of 81 ,855, CT about one
half Of the total number destroyed in one
third of the total area in which they were
destroyed.
The evidence of the witnesses from the
other parishes did not show any increase in
the number Of rat eaten canes during the
same period. Most of the witnesses said
they rarely see a rat-eaten cane.
5. We cannot therefore but conclude,
that the fleet of the Mongoose Destruction
Act has been to so coGsid erably reduce the
number of mongooses in certain districts as
to cause a great increase in the damage done
by rats to the canes in those districts.
s. There is ample evidence that mon
gooses do destroy rats, but as the latter
commit their depredations by night and re-
main in their hiding places during The day,
ard as mongooses prey only by day, they
must find it very difficult to get hold of rats.
They must be i'll overwhelming numbers to
do very much good. 1t is very probable
that then presence does more to keep cane
fields tree from rats than their destruction
Of them.
Z. The very extensive Investigations
made seme years agoby the Rev. NIB Wat
son when he examined the stomachs of fifty
nine mongooses in order to determine what
they live on, in our opinion, render any
further inve stigation INTO this matter quite
unnecessary. The result arrived at by him
was that mongooses eat whatever they find
when they go out to feed, whether it be a
rat, a bird, a frog, a lizard or a chicken. We,
therefore, consider that no good can result
from the proposed examination of the stom-
aChs Of Que hundred in0ng0oses, especially