Journal of the Department of Agriculture, Western Australia, Series 4 Volume 17 Number 3 1976 Article 6 1-1-1976 Bounty systems in vermin control S J O Whitehouse Follow this and additional works at: https://researchlibrary.agric.wa.gov.au/journal_agriculture4 Part of the Behavior and Ethology Commons, Benefits and Compensation Commons, and the Other Animal Sciences Commons Recommended Citation Whitehouse, S J O (1976) "Bounty systems in vermin control," Journal of the Department of Agriculture, Western Australia, Series 4: Vol. 17 : No. 3 , Article 6. Available at: https://researchlibrary.agric.wa.gov.au/journal_agriculture4/vol17/iss3/6 This article is brought to you for free and open access by Research Library. It has been accepted for inclusion in Journal of the Department of Agriculture, Western Australia, Series 4 by an authorized administrator of Research Library. For more information, please contact [email protected], [email protected], [email protected]. Bounty systems in vermin control ". almost total lack of success, usually accompanied by frauds" Simon Whitehouse injurious to, man's interests. The as the bonus payment. Today money Agriculture Protection Board of most frequent targets are predators. is the usual payment, although other Western Australia Such programmes have been in valuable tender, such as livestock, operation around the world for has been used. For more than 3 000 years man about 3 000 years. The ancient Jacobsen (3) carried out a compre­ has tried to reduce the numbers of Greeks paid bounties on wolves (1) hensive survey of the various systems pest animals by payment of bounties. and, since then, bounties have been that have operated in the United In general, the system has failed. paid on a wide variety of animals. States. In reviewing the basic re­ This article, by a research scientist These have ranged from predators of quirements of any scheme, he quotes who specializes in the study of de­ stock—wolves, bears, dingoes, etc.— from an 1896 report of the United clared (pest) animals in Western through to such animals as emus, States Department of Agriculture. Australia reviews some of the liter­ seals, crows, mountain lions, squir­ Dr. T. S. Palmer, at that time First ature about bounties and comments rels and porcupines, and the reasons Assistant in the U.S. Biological on the situation in Australia. why the bounties have been offered Surveys, stated: are varied. Any scheme intended to bring It concludes that the arguments in It is difficult to find in the literature about the extermination of a favour of bounty systems for animal species must fulfil certain con­ population management are extremely any documented cases which report the successful use of the bounty ditions before it can prove success­ hard to justify, and little evidence of ful in practice: the operation of any successful bounty system. The little support that can system can be found. be found appears to consist of • It must be applied over a wide letters and articles in non-technical Bounty systems appear to be area, practically covering the range journals, based largely on opinions of the species, otherwise the animal counter-productive in terms of al­ rather than facts. leviating the problems caused by will increase in the unprotected pest animals. As a means of rural In the United States, bounties date region. subsidy they are illogical. back to 1683 (2) when the State of • It should be uniform (that is, Pennsylvania introduced bounties to the rates should be the same) in all control predators of game. Since localities. "Bonus" or "bounty" systems then all American States have, at • It should provide some induce­ may be defined as the payment of various times, inaugurated similar ment for carrying out its pro­ rewards to hunters for the killing of programmes. Most States still use visions. animals regarded as pests. The bounty systems. • It should be economical, for, if systems are intended to control ani­ In colonial America, tobacco was a expensive, the cost will exceed the mals that either compete with, or are medium of exchange and was used losses which it seeks to avert. 85 Journal of Agriculture Vol 17 No 3, 1976 • It should provide, so far as is The Michigan Department of Con­ Virginia encouraged the killing of possible, against fraud or the mis­ servation reported as follows in 1922: wolves almost from the date of its appropriation of public funds. The history of the Michigan bounty first settlement and has, at times, law on predacious things is dotted paid $25 each for their scalps. How­ Hamilton (4) enumerated another ever wolves in that State were not requirement, that "theoretically, a with the work of those who padded bounty orders, manu­ exterminated until the Civil War bounty must be high enough to period, after the rewards had been in ensure the destruction of at least a factured woodchuck scalps by sewing ears on pieces of pelts, force for more than two centuries. majority of the individuals during Even then, their extermination was the first bounty season". collected bounty on house-cats claiming them to be "wild-cats", not because of the bounty, but From a model simulating coyote of substituting blackbird heads for rather through the settlement of the population dynamics Connolly and baby crow heads; of claimants State(lO). Longhurst (5) determined that if the stealing from township clerks the Probably the most detailed exami­ annual kill was 75 per cent., the once bountied and discarded scalps nation of any bounty system was population could be exterminated and heads; of others who pur­ carried out by Fairley, when he in slightly more than 50 years. How­ chased Wisconsin weasel, where no examined the Northern Ireland sys­ ever when they studied the data from bounty is paid, and collected a tem of fox control. He concluded a county in California, they con­ bounty in Michigan on them, that the only fox "predator" was man cluded the coyote numbers were not falsely swearing they had been and that, by a variety of methods, a being reduced at all; instead, the captured in this State. large number of foxes were killed reproduction rate was being locally each year. He believed that this stimulated. One of the most amazing frauds must be that cited by Hamilton where hunting, whether bounty-inspired or The problems facing the use of a payment of a bonus of $50 on a otherwise, did not make any sub­ bonus payments to control animal wolf scalp in the New York State stantial long-term difference to the numbers are large. Fairley (6) des­ was made in 1947. There had been population. The reasons were: cribed the central problem as being no authentic record of a wolf in that • If the bounty is affecting foxes two-fold: State since around the turn of the in N. Ireland, it is curious that it • The payment must be large century. is maintaining them at a more or enough to induce a kill in one sea­ less constant level without reduc­ son which is appreciably larger ing them further. When bounties than that caused by the natural "Bonuses, in themselves, have were suspended in certain mortality factors. not been responsible for the countries, there was no sign of an • If the initial reduction is satisfactory control of any increase in the animals. achieved the hunting of the smaller predator population" • There are many areas where numbers requires more effort and, foxes are not hunted, often because unless greater and greater bounties But the possibility of fraud occur­ they are remote or inaccessible or are paid, equilibrium is reached or ring is by no means the main draw­ no-one bothers to hunt them. the species is allowed to move to back of the bounty systems. Bonuses, • Statistical analysis of the its original level. Alternatively, in themselves, have not been respons­ bounty figures tends to suggest that the hunters, whose interests are ible/or the satisfactory control of any the numbers of foxes caught in concerned, will ensure that the predator population. winter and early summer bear no animal is not exterminated. The Pennsylvania Game Commis­ relation to the numbers caught Jacobsen discussed many systems sion paid a bounty on weasels for next winter. that have been evolved, and the over half a century and, at the end of • It can be concluded that less, theme is generally one of almost that time, the largest number of possibly much less than 33 percent total lack of success, usually accom­ weasels during the history of the of adults are killed by man and panied by frauds. As soon as the bounty were being presented annually very much less than 44 per cent monetary incentive becomes high for payment. of the cubs. enough to satisfy the first criterion In Minnesota, a 12-year bounty above, frauds of two basic kinds period for foxes yielded evidence of a occur. steady rise in the fox population. At The first is caused by the non­ first 25 000 were killed per year, but uniform payment of bonuses in this rose steadily to 40 000. different areas. This results in the The payment of bounties on movement of scalps or other proofs squirrels in Great Britain appears to of destruction from areas of low or have had no effect on the population. no bonus, to areas of high bonus pay­ Wolves and coyote populations in ments. Ontario appear to be totally The second type of fraud consists unaffected by the payment of bon­ of the substitution of the scalp of an uses^. 8). animal of no bonus value for that of The bounty does not appear to an animal on which the bonus is have had any effect on the mountain being paid.