§ THE EARL OF ILCHESTER had the following Notice on the Paper:—To ask His Majesty's Government what steps have been taken to limit and prevent the ravages of the musk rat under the powers of the recent Act; whether those steps have been successful; and also whether they are aware that nutria are now being introduced into the country, and that these animals are capable of doing as much damage as musk rats; and whether they have taken any and what preventive steps to meet this further danger; and to move for Papers.
§ The Noble Earl said: My Lords, I have put down the Questions which are on the Paper on behalf of my fellow Trustees of the British Museum, who view with the greatest alarm the rapid increase of the musk rat in this country, and even if I had felt inclined at this late stage in the proceedings this evening to put off my Motion until another day, I think that the urgency of the matter is one which cannot be got over. We are quite aware that the Ministry of Agriculture have the matter of these animals which are in captivity well under supervision under the Destructive Imported Animals Act of this year, but we are anxious to know exactly how this Act is operating and how successful it is for its purpose. Still more we wish to hear that wide and progressive steps are being taken and will be taken in the future to secure the location and destruction of these animals which, unfortunately, are far too numerous in this country. These animals have been imported into this country, as your Lordships are probably aware, for the value of their skins, and, at the risk of boring the House, I propose to say a few words on the general characteristics of the musk rat to show your Lordships 1047 how great the danger is and that the Trustees are not unduly alarmist in the matter.
§ The musk rat comes from North America. It is at least three times the size of the ordinary rat and lives in river banks, dams, and various embankments. It is nocturnal in its habits. It burrows very fast and, as most of the entrance holes which it makes are below the water, your Lordships will understand the difficulty of finding out where it is. It remains during the summer months in the tunnels that it makes, and as each adult rat usually makes it own tunnel it is easy to understand that these banks are rapidly undermined and that their collapse is only a question of time. In the winter months it makes itself a large mound of rushes and grass in which thirty or forty of them live for the winter and feed on the grass which is in these mounds. The mounds are often placed on ditches or small waterways which they proceed to block up and thereby cause flooding in many areas.
§ The musk rat is extremely prolific. It has two or three families a year of nine or ten young ones. To give some illustration of how fast they increase I may mention Germany, where the situation is very serious indeed. In Germany in 1905 five musk rats were introduced into Bohemia. It is believed that no others were brought in. Yet in 1928 a reliable authority computed their numbers at over one hundred million. The German Government is taking this matter up very seriously because they realise the danger to their big public works; but it has almost got beyond them, for the reason that Czecho-Slovakia next door is doing very little, from lack of funds probably, to help. As fast as they kill them in Germany the rats pour back over the frontier. There is an illustration of the pace at which these rats can travel which may be of interest. An experiment was made on the Danube a few months ago of letting out a few marked animals and one of these, within a fortnight, was recaptured 50 kilometres up stream; so your Lordships will realise how fast these animals move.
§ In England a few musk rats were brought in more or less surreptitiously in 1927 and 1928, but it was not until 1929 that any large farm was started. The matter was brought to the notice 1048 of the Trustees of the British Museum by the Ministry of Agriculture early in 1930. The Trustees then gave as their opinion that it was most undesirable in every possible way to allow these animals to be brought into this country without restriction, and they foretold great trouble from them. That has been their attitude ever since. No Act was brought in to deal with the matter until the summer of 1931, when the matter was debated in your Lordships' House; but the Act was not passed until this spring. It came into force on May 1 last. Therefore the position here is that the musk rat had four years' start of us.
§ I will now tell your Lordships as shortly as possible the position as we understand it. No doubt the noble Earl will be able to supplement my information. In Shropshire, where the first farm was started at a place called Shrawardine, nearly 350 square miles, we are told, are now infested by this pest. The Severn for 70 miles, and its tributaries, are full of holes which can be seen when the river is low, some of them big enough for a man to crawl into. Trees are falling in consequence and there is very serious likelihood of floods. The animals are known to be moving over into Montgomeryshire, Cheshire and Staffordshire. They have reached the Wye Valley and are known to be at Hereford. A colony has been located close to Gloucester quite recently. They are in Surrey, Kent, and Essex; and the East Riding of Yorkshire, I understand, is full of them, especially along the L.N.E.R. line between Doncaster and York and between Selby and Hull. In Scotland possibly the situation is even more serious than anywhere. The Valleys of the Earn, the Allan, and the Forth are colonised. The rats are in the embankments of many of the lochs and reservoirs, and parts of the embankments of the L.M.S. Railway between Perth and Stirling are very badly infested. In fact they extend from the east coast from Aberdeenshire and Fife-shire right across Loch Lomond. We understand that the Scottish Office have this matter in hand and no doubt we shall hear more of what they are doing.
§ The point I want to bring to your Lordships' notice specially is the fact that the places I have mentioned are not by 1049 any means the only places which are affected. We do not know all the places where the animals are. It is quite possible that the first intimation of their presence is the collapse of a big dam or bank. Therefore the Trustees do urge the Ministry to undertake a general survey of the whole of the inland waterways of the country in order to find out exactly where these animals are, so that they may be dealt with. This naturally must be undertaken as a national business. It may be said: "Oh, this is a rat matter, and a matter for the local authority to deal with. County councils have rat catchers. Let them deal with the matter." I can assure your Lordships that that is the one way in which the matter must not be dealt with. It would be like Germany and Czecho Slovakia. One county might take steps to deal with the matter and other counties around, possibly from ignorance that the rat was there, would be doing nothing. The whole of the good work which that one county was doing would be rendered quite useless. It must be dealt with as a whole. Another reason is that catching and destroying these animals is a very scientific process. A plan of campaign has to be, worked out and it is no good dealing with it in one place and not in another. A whole scheme must be arranged.
§ I hope, therefore, that we shall hear that the Ministry are increasing their staff very largely to deal with this pest. We know that they are increasing their staff to some extent, but I think it will need the employment of a very large number of men, and I am afraid it will mean a great deal of expense. I hope that we shall be told that the Ministry are approaching the Treasury for a really adequate grant to deal with this danger. The last thing I would wish at this moment, when I know that economy is the most important thing of all, is to suggest that large expenditure should be undertaken, but it is really a matter of economy to deal with this matter at once. I can assure your Lordships that every day is of importance, especially at this time of year when these animals can be most easily caught. You may have to spend some thousands of pounds now, possibly many thousands, but I am quite sure if your Lordships will visualise the effect of dams bursting, possibly vil- 1050 lages being carried away and large areas flooded, you will realise that though thousands may be spent now it might mean a loss of millions later, and when you tried to cope with the problem you might find that it had got out of hand.
§ Then I should like to say one word about the nutria. The nutria is as big as a beaver, and though it is possibly less prolific and probably less active its size makes it all the more dangerous. We ask the Ministry of Agriculture to schedule this animal, as they can do under the Act, to restrict its importation, and to insist that it must be kept under licence. It has been introduced in the last three months, I understand, probably by the people who have these musk rat farms and who are bored by the restrictions and constant examination which goes on under that Act. The two animals have identical habits. No doubt, we shall be told that they are quite harmless, but I think your Lordships will remember that we have already several other foreign pests which have been introduced into this country. We have the grey squirrel, we have the little owl and now we have the musk rat. Surely it would be almost criminal folly to allow these animals to be brought into the country without any restriction and then sit quietly down and wait to see what damage is done.
THE CHAIRMAN OF COMMITTEES (THE EARL OF ONDSLOW)MY Lords, before the noble Earl replies may I say a word on this subject? My noble friend behind me said that the best time for catching these animals is the winter. I gathered that they are more easily caught in winter than at any other time. The point I wish to make, however, is that, as yore Lordships all know, all fur-bearing animals are at their best in the winter and their fur is then most saleable. The noble Earl told us that the musk rat was imported into this country for the purpose of cultivating the animals for the sake of their fur. He said that there would be great expense, but I venture to suggest to the noble Earl that that expense might be considerably mitigated by the fact that these musk rats are fur-bearing animals and that the best time to catch them is the winter when their fur is at its best. Therefore it really ought not to cost a great deal. I should have 1051 thought that possibly the sale of musquash might meet a certain part of the cost.
§ EARL DE LA WARRMy Lords, this is a very important subject, and we are very pleased to have it raised. When the Destructive Imported Animals Act became law last spring the importation and keeping of musk rats except under licence was prohibited by order. The Musk Rat (Importation and Keeping) Regulations, 1932, impose upon licence holders stringent conditions designed to reduce to a minimum any risk of escape. A successful prosecution was recently undertaken against a licence holder whose records were not available for inspection when an officer of the Ministry called. Actually only fourteen licences to keep musk rats have been issued in England and Wales, and two in Scotland. No licences to import have as yet been issued. The noble Earl has already told your Lordships that the chief centre of infestation is Shropshire, where rats had escaped from a fur farm before the passing of the Act. The County Council have co-operated with the Ministry in a trapping campaign which started last May, and over a thousand rats had been caught up to October 21. Plans are now going forward for an extension of that campaign and it is hoped to have thirty trappers employed there by the end of the year.
On the point which the noble Earl raised of a survey all over the country, he may be interested to know that the Ministry has written to all catchment boards and canal owners in England and Wales, asking for their co-operation in reporting any indication of the presence of the musk rat and in taking steps to destroy any that may be at large. In Scotland musk rats are at large on White Moss Loch and the tenant has been given until 1st May, 1933, in which to trap off these rats. If he has not succeeded by then the Department will enter and do the work itself. A fence has been erected round the loch to prevent the spread of the animals and it is now intended to replace this fence with one of stouter construction. Musk rats are also at large on the bank of Carsebrech Loch and it is intended to engage a trapping staff this winter to be trained by Herr Roith, if he is available. This work in Scotland is under the direct administration of the Department of Agriculture for Scotland.
1052 With regard to nutria, this is an animal which is, as the noble Lord says, of similar destructive habits to those of the musk rat. The Trustees of the British Museum have asked the Ministry of Agriculture to put through Parliament the affirmative Resolution necessary to bring this animal within the provisions of the Destructive Imported Animals Act. We have already informed the Director of the Natural History Museum that if the Trustees can let us have further information which would convince us and convince Parliament we would certainly be ready to consider taking action. The market price of nutria is at present about £10 per pair and so it can be assumed that owners in their own interests would take care to prevent escape. In Germany, where the authorities may be assumed to be anxious to prevent any repetition of the musk rat trouble, while scientific opinion condemns the keeping of nutria no Government action has as yet been taken. On the question of the profitableness of trapping I am afraid I cannot really give your Lordships any information, but when you consider the cost of the trapping I should not imagine that it is likely to be very profitable. Keeping cows in a cowshed and milking them regularly may be profitable, but if you had to engage a large number of trappers to go out to trap the cows it would be a different matter.
THE EARL OF CRAWFORDMy Lords, I have heard the speech of the noble Earl with dismay. It gives me the impression that his Department does not begin to realise how serious this problem is. He says there has been a prosecution and that they are taking steps to prevent the risk of escape. He also says that his colleague at the Scottish Office has ordered a loch in Scotland to be fenced round. This is really playing with the subject. Prosecutions do not matter now. Fencing lochs or canal banks or areas do not matter now. What we have to do now is to deal with a pest which is scattered all over the country, and so far as I can see the noble Earl and his colleagues are doing nothing effective in that direction. There have been already great delays—a marked reluctance on the part of the Ministry to deal with this subject at all. The plea by the Trustees of the British Museum was deferred and deferred until it was only six or seven 1053 months ago that any legislation was passed. We have in fact waited so long that a wholly new problem has arisen.
It is not carelessness on the part of the individual that matters. This is not going to be stopped by prosecuting people who do not make declarations to the Ministry of Agriculture. What we have to do is to get the animal before it becomes the pest that it is in Central Europe. The noble Earl says that a thousand rats have been caught, but in Germany it is estimated that there are 20,000,000 of them.
THE EARL OF CRAWFORDA hundred millions—and this country is in some ways more vulnerable than Southern Germany and Czealio-Slovakia, where these pests flourish. The Ministry of Agriculture has to get money for this. The Chairman of Committee thinks there may be some provision in aid from the Treasury.
THE EARL OF CRAWFORDThen let the Ministry of Agriculture persuade the Treasury. It is no use saying that one county must do it, because if you take steps in one area and analogous steps are not taken in surrounding areas new breeding centres are created. The animal is an astonishing beast and he is extremely elusive. If the Ministry of Agriculture think only of a few prosecutions and boasts of a thousand demises, let me assure them that they are not tackling the subject with the seriousness it deserves. We have heard this afternoon about the real tragedy of agriculture. Supposing on top of the situation described by Lord Hastings in East Anglia, for instance, there was a flood of twenty thousand or thirty thousand 1054 acres: the state of the agricultural community and its finances is such that years might elapse before the land ceased to be waterlogged. Here is something which the Department can really do—something which they can show they understand is a danger to British husbandry. I hope they will act promptly. They want more information from the Trustees of the British Museum about the nutria. They shall have it, but I think they might have got it before. Here again it is another case of looking upon the matter as the sort of subject that a crank Peer might raise. But they should put out an interim order pending inquiries by the Museum. I hope that my noble friend who raised this matter will, in withdrawing his Motion, ask that the subject shall be again brought before the House in order that he may know what the Government are doing.
THE EARL OF ILCHESTERMy Lords, I am exceedingly disappointed with the answer which the noble Earl has given, and I agree with what the noble Earl, Lord Crawford, has said. If I bring this matter up again in a few weeks, as I shall hope to do, I trust that the noble Earl will then have looked a little further into the case of Scotland. To fence one loch as a remedy for something which is occurring everywhere between the west and east coasts seems to be a waste of time. In regard to the nutria I think a great risk is being run in putting this matter off. I have heard of one farm in Essex and another in Cornwall, and I am told of a case in France where they have been recently let out and a lot of damage was done. I beg leave to withdraw the Motion.
§ Motion for Papers, by leave, withdrawn.
§ House adjourned at half-past seven o'clock.