THE RABBIT TANK TRAP [AUSTRALIA]

[micky 3,325]

I have read that three Men caught 25000 RABBITS  in one Week in 1949 and sold them to Dealer  for  5 .1/2d a couple  [nearly 2. 1/2 p in new money , all the way through the article there were references  to the type of  trapping  but i have no idea  what it was.  

 

[Torquemada 288]

It's probably just a rabbit drop trap. Find a run, typically under a fence, dig a big hole, bury drop trap and don't set it until the rabbits start using the run/new tunnel again. Then set it, hey presto - rabbits magically appear in the underground tank.

[micky 3,325]

42 minutes ago, Torquemada said:

It's probably just a rabbit drop trap. Find a run, typically under a fence, dig a big hole, bury drop trap and don't set it until the rabbits start using the run/new tunnel again. Then set it, hey presto - rabbits magically appear in the underground tank.

That is not really possible 3500 a day is a lot of Bunnies , each man would have to handle about 1150 Rabbits a day ....how did it work ??? . Another part of the article was the prices they got on example was the Skins  £1  a  lb  from poisoned  Rabbits  . There was thousands working in the industry  and the pay was fantastic  wages could be £5-10 pounds a week which was a fortune in the  30 -40s .

[OldPhil 5,677]

On 04/05/2022 at 09:32, micky said:

That is not really possible 3500 a day is a lot of Bunnies , each man would have to handle about 1150 Rabbits a day ....how did it work ??? . Another part of the article was the prices they got on example was the Skins  £1  a  lb  from poisoned  Rabbits  . There was thousands working in the industry  and the pay was fantastic  wages could be £5-10 pounds a week which was a fortune in the  30 -40s .

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Yes, that quantity of Shushi's going over, a large area, to then fall into a big old hole in the ground, would be improbable..

Mind you, those good old boys, back in the day, working in the rabbit areas, certainly did take a fair parcel of conies,..so who knows...?

 

At the age of 15, Jack McCRAITH reached a momentous decision; "Everyone knows how to catch rabbits," he said. "I'll learn how to sell them." On his first buying trip, he biked into the countryside and bought two rabbits which he skinned in the back yard and hawked around the neighbours. Within 20 years he controlled a rabbit empire which stretched across half of Australia. In a 40 year career, he exported more than 130 million rabbits. Wherever the rabbits went, he went too. Rabbit chillers and trucks, emblazoned with the legend JOHN A. McCRAITH, Rabbit Exporter, Spencer Street, Melbourne, dotted the back country from the Simpson Desert to the Nullabor Plains. It was a cut-throat and difficult industry filled with unscrupulous people and dreamers. Chillers were robbed or sabotaged, buyers absconded with the buying money, trucks broke down hundreds of kilometres from the nearest garage. The trappers were tough men but Jack McCRAITH was tougher. When he had to sort out problems in the bush, he used his fists. His methods were unorthodox. He was a big gambler and he brought the same gambling instincts to his business life. Many of the exporters went broke, but Jack McCRAITH survived and prospered. The Rabbit King is the previously untold story of the Australian rabbit industry, and how it kept some people alive in the harshest times and made other people very rich. It is also a personal re-telling of an old story about a poor boy who makes good. It is the story of the rise and rise of a man who perfectly suited his time and all that reveals about the way we lived and thought then.

Edited April 8 by OldPhil

[micky 3,325]

I have been informed that the Rabbit Tank  was a Mesh fence that  surrounded a water hole where Rabbits could enter but not exit , this is along the lines that i was thinking but i still cannot see how three Men could keep that pace up for a day never mind 7

[OldPhil 5,677]

24 minutes ago, micky said:

I have been informed that the Rabbit Tank  was a Mesh fence that  surrounded a water hole where Rabbits could enter but not exit , this is along the lines that i was thinking but i still cannot see how three Men could keep that pace up for a day never mind 7

 Yeah,.. sounds like a good strong Holly stick job,...I reckon it would have been,... a tad brutal...

[micky 3,325]

3 minutes ago, W. Katchum said:

That makes sense, like ye say still some graft tho 

There was  a Book written some years ago by Richard Fawcett RABBITY DICK  AKA The Pennine Poacher , he lived just outside of Bentham on the Clapham road , our neighbour  in Ingelton new him well because she was born in Bentham in 1932 he caused uproar in the 50s when he killed another farmer with a Pitchfork and went on trial for his life and everyone in the area wanted to hang , he got away with it then caused another scandal when he ran away with Ivy Mossop  a well to-do Married Woman  and set up home with her, he wrote other books about the Dales Railways  and he worked as a Ganger out of Ribble Head  Station

 

[mackem 26,263]

38 minutes ago, micky said:

There was  a Book written some years ago by Richard Fawcett RABBITY DICK  AKA The Pennine Poacher ,

Fantastic book, I remember the tales he told, I hope I still have it in storage

[socks 32,253]

11 hours ago, micky said:

That is not really possible 3500 a day is a lot of Bunnies , each man would have to handle about 1150 Rabbits a day ....how did it work ??? . Another part of the article was the prices they got on example was the Skins  £1  a  lb  from poisoned  Rabbits  . There was thousands working in the industry  and the pay was fantastic  wages could be £5-10 pounds a week which was a fortune in the  30 -40s .

On those figures they would have to have been killing a rabbit every minuet for 24 hours non stop for a week …

[comanche 2,944]

20 minutes ago, socks said:

On those figures they would have to have been killing a rabbit every minuet for 24 hours non stop for a week …

Maybe there was a gang of aboriginal workers involved who didn't warrent a mention while the three,probably white,  men took the credit and the profit.

[mackem 26,263]

30 minutes ago, comanche said:

Maybe there was a gang of aboriginal workers involved who didn't warrent a mention while the three,probably white,  men took the credit and the profit.

White privilege oh, and a bit of BLM thrown in. 

[comanche 2,944]

https://youtu.be/_8hDDVuAm3A

1949 . Definately a group effort .    I wonder if our three enterprising entrepreneurs who found a market for the tunnel mutton were in this beating line?

Or would they be  busy on their mobile phones arranging a good price.

 

 

[bell 3,591]

17 hours ago, W. Katchum said:

Where can I order that? Wonder if it’s audio book, sounds like a job I’d have loved

The Mole King.......can see it now Don 

[wilbur foxhound 480]

They would be most likely using multiple traps not just one each,I would think killing a thousand rabbits in 8 hours could be done no problem if lifting them out of a box/tank ,a good bricklayer should lay a thousand bricks in a day easily,wf

[micky 3,325]

The Sheep Pastures were fenced off from the Rabbits and were sited were the water Table was high enough to support strong Grass growth for the Lambs, when the lambs were turned out of  the Pastures holes /gaps  were made in the fence to allow the Rabbits in , the Rabbits lived above the pastures in  the Ridgelines and barren wasteland and could be seen in the evening  traveling to the grass in their thousands from miles around , after a few weeks the holes were blocked at midnight and all people from the local Township would start to beat the Rabbits into Funnels that lead to the Tanks which were areas that were enclosed  with wire and covered at the top there they were killed and taken to the Freezers which were placed in readiness , after this was a massive Piss up payed  for by the Farmer . This was in New Zealand , must have been a sight to see.