The Colville examiner. [volume] (Colville, Wash.) 1907-1948, 1920-05-29
SWAT THE SQUIRREL" AND
WE'LL ELIMINATE HIM

some rather stringent criticism OF
the mistreatment accorded farmers
by the county agent recently appear
ed from the Summit Valley corre-
spondent of a local paper.
The county agent does not feel
any resentment at this criticism, al
though he does feel that if the author
of the criticism were better acquaint-
ed with some of the difficulties con-
nected with such work as mixing
squirrel poison, that she would have
been a little more charit9 Bile.
Leo. X. Couch Of the [. S. bureau
of biological survey and myself have
personally mixed all the squirrel
poison used in the county, except, of
course where the farmers mixed their
own.
LAST year the matter of mixing and
distributing squirrel poison was new
and he poison untried; the demard
for the poison for these reasons was
not so great and it was possible for
Mr.. Couch and your agent at that
time to mix the poison demanded
without excessive effort
The demand this year has practic-
ally doubled over that of last year,
which made mixing and distributing
the poison a very strenuous task.
In fact, | will say that | have never
spent a more strenuous >iX weeks in
my life and [ have done some hard
work
The facts are that The use of the
squirrel poison has entirely outgrown
this method Of mixing and distribut-
ing. We woGld not complain Of the
hard work of this way of doing it il
it were possible to give satisfaction
to all concerned, bat it hasn't been
possible to give satisfaction and the
correspondent at Summit Valley
which gave the criticism simply
proves that The old way Of mixing
and distributing the poison is anti
quated and out of date.
On the morning of the day when
we missed getting to Summit Valley,
Mr.. Couch and myself started out Il
little after for Rice; we went across
the summiC from Rice to Grin and as
the roads were fresh we got stuck
once which delayed US awhile. We
had a large mix at Rice which mad
us late getting away from there;
we then wen, to the Saints church
where we had another heavy mix
which threw us late getting away
from there; we got to Clifford late in
the afternoon and had to make a faiT
sized mix there, and iH fact we
made two mixes, one to take care of
the crowd there and one to fill a
number of orders left at the store
We got through at . o'clock. 1t it
had been possible we would have
phoncd to Summit Valley telling the
people that we could not make their
meeting; we spoke Of doing so but
the line was out of order.
We merely recite the foregoing to
show some of the difficulties Of this
method of distributing the poison
To 90 to the opposite side of tho
story and present the disadvantages
of this system from the farmers
standpoint, will say that the valuable
seeding time wasted by the farmers
waiting for us at the various mixing
meetings--totaling in the aggregate
many days besides the Inconvenience
and discomfort Of waiting for some
one to appear-shows that this sys-
TEN of getting the poison around is
ready for the discard.
The test case from Spokane county
testing the validity of the pest dis
trict law is on the desk of the state
supreme court and will be taken up
this month or early next month. 1t
is the opinion of the writer that the
law will stand. Whatever the de-
cision of the court may be, the mat
ter of Stevens county's pest district
will be taken up soon after the de-
cision is handed down.
Mr.. Couch and myself have dis
cussed considerably what arrange
ment for handling the poison should
be made in case the pest district
should pass in the county; as you
probably know the plan outlined in
this county was to levy a small tax
merely for the purpose of supplying
money to manufacture ana furnish
the poison to all the farmers needing
it.
We do not deem it advisable to at
tempt to hire men to do the poison
ing; this is a range country and the
range is we'll stocked. 1t is the
opinion of the writer that should he
attempt to hire men to do the poison
ing he would get much inefficient
and careless work, which would not
only waste money but would en-
danger livestock on the range.
Please keep in mind mat the pest
di strict for Stevens county calls for
only a small tax for the purpose OF
mixing and distributing the poison