News and citizen. [volume] (Morrisville, Vt. ;) 1881-current, 1922-03-08
HEDGEHOGS?
WANTS A HEDGEHOG
BOARD CREATED
Bethel Correspondent Gets Sarcastic
In Showing Up One Department of
State Expense

To the Editor:
Happening to be in the Town
Clerks Office recently when a boy
brought in sack of hedgehog heads
to collect the bounty thereon, l was
struck with the wasteful, unscientific,
unsanitary and slipshod way in which
our state now allows this great
natural resource to be exploited.
Under the present law nobody gets
anything out OF 1t but the killer of the
beast and the Town Clerk. The for
mer gets 80 cents a head and the
Clerk gets measley cents for maxi
ing the examination and filing out the
certificates. The benefits of this in
dustry should be more wide spread,
and to that end I am prompted to
make the following suggestions of
changes in the law.
The next legislature should provide
for a Board of Hedgehog Commission
ers, consisting of not less than seven
persons, tit would seem as if there
were enough deserving persons, not
now on any of the Boards and Com
missions already created by the legis-
lature,) whose duty it should be to
choose as secretary, a man well known
for his knowledge of biology and ZOO
logy, who should be entitled to a nom
inal salary-say $4,000 per year and
expenses. His first duty on assuming
Office should be to write a book, of
not less than 800 pages, to be publish
ed and distributed at the expense of
hn Ctnt 70 ir,ey oil IiI1,a h,a
question. as to whether the animal we
are now paying bounty on is a true
porcupine or just a plain hedgehog;
whether he can throw his quills by
switching his tail; and give all other
information known to science regard
ing his habitat, mode of life, and the
best means of propagation At least
five of the concluding chapters of the
book should be devoted to the best
most humane and most sanitary
means of harvesting the crop. This
is very important, for it is now claim
ed that extremely barbarous methods
are employed such as clubbing the
poor creature to death, or shooting
him full of leaden bullets. 1t is said
that a full grown animal of this
species will stay in tree after being
riddled with dozen 80 calibre bullets.
If the book says there should be a ,
painless killing, the Board of Health
should be empowered and required to
furnish chloroform Cat the expense of
the State) for the purpose.
The Board of Commissioners should
be further authorized to appoint
~ r. l..
who should have the power to name
wardens in each town. The Deputy
commissioners and wardens should
not receive a stated salary, but should
only get a per diem, expenses and
milage.
This book might be adopted as a
textbook for study in our rural
schools, subject to the approval of the
Board of Health, the Board of Educa-
ton, the Commissioner of Education. I.
he Deputy Commissioner, the Super
visors and Deputy Supervisors, the
Superintendent and Deputy Super
and the Town School Di-
'ector-nO, no need to say anything
% the town directors, for their only
luty is to pay the bliss incurred by
hose officials higher up.
Also, the state might establish n
chool for the study of Natural His
DRY, with especial reference to hedge .
logs, or perhaps separate depart
lent for this purpose might be added {
0 the agricultural school and to the
everal subsidized colleges, with a
pecial corps of teachers.
The scheme as outlined above may
OF be perfect in all it's details but is =
ffered subject of amendment. The :,
lain thing is to spread the benefits of
his great natural resource more wide =
and to aid in preventing a much :
readed surplus in the State Treasury. Z
r. ]. FLINT !,
ethel, VT.