RABBITS AND LYNXES IN THE NORTH-WEST
There are no Rabbits in the north-west. This statement, far from
final, is practically true to-day, but I saw plenty of Lynxes, and
one cannot write of ducks without mentioning water.
All wild animals fluctuate greatly in their population, none
more so than the Snowshoe or white-rabbit of the north-west. This
is Rabbit history as far back as known: They are spread over some
great area; conditions are favourable; some unknown influence endows
the females with unusual fecundity; they bear not one, but two or
three broods in a season, and these number not 2 or 3, but 8 or 10
each brood. The species increases far beyond the powers of predaceous
birds or beasts to check, and the Rabbits after 7 or 8 years of
this are multiplied into untold millions. On such occasions every
little thicket has a Rabbit in it; they jump out at every 8 or 10
feet; they number not less than 100 to the acre on desirable ground,
which means over 6,000 to the square mile, and a region as large as
Alberta would contain not less than 100,000,000 fat white bunnies.
At this time one man can readily kill 100 or 200 Rabbits in a day,
and every bird and beast of prey is slaughtering Rabbits without
restraint. Still they increase. Finally, they are so extraordinarily
superabundant that they threaten their own food supply as well as
poison all the ground. A new influence appears on the scene; it is
commonly called the plague, though it is not one disease but many
run epidemic riot, and, in a few weeks usually, the Rabbits are
wiped out.
This is an outline of the established routine in Rabbit vital
statistics. It, of course, varies greatly in every detail, including
time and extent of territory involved, and when the destruction is
complete it is an awful thing for the carnivores that have lived
on the bunny millions and multiplied in ratio with their abundance.
Of all the northern creatures none are more dependent on the Rabbits
than is the Canada Lynx. It lives on Rabbits, follows the Rabbits,
thinks Rabbits, tastes like Rabbits, increases with them, and on
their failure dies of starvation in the unrabbited woods.
It must have been a Hibernian familiar with the north that said:
"A Lynx is nothing but an animated Rabbit anyway."
The Rabbits of the Mackenzie River Valley reached their flood
height in the winter of 1903-4. That season, it seems, they actually
reached billions.
Late the same winter the plague appeared, but did not take them at
one final swoop. Next winter they were still numerous, but in 1907
there seemed not one Rabbit left alive in the country. All that
summer we sought for them and inquired for them.
