The Fish River bush, South Africa, and its wild animals / by W.T. Black.

  • Black, W. T. (William Thomas)
Date:
1901
Catalogue details

Licence: In copyright

Credit: The Fish River bush, South Africa, and its wild animals / by W.T. Black. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    flocks, instead of hunting them for sport, the farmers have got rid of them in a wholesale manner. Pieces of meat impreg- nated with strychnine are deposited here and there over a certain property, and the wolf, if it partakes of any of them, is generally found dead not further than 100 yards off*. This poison is so strong, that the flesh of the poisoned animal be- comes itself poisonous, and will act nearly as powerfully as the original bait, whatever animal partakes of it. Their large, dog-like spoor may sometimes be seen during wet weather, when they are more daring than usual. They are sometimes seen by travellers in the Trumpeter’s Hill road, and have proved such a source of obstruction to some people, as to make them retrace their steps; and on these occasions they appear in troops. They do not generally act on the offensive, hut fight desperately when attacked. Their enormous jaws and powerful strong teeth enable them to crush a limb or break a very stout stick like a twig. An old Boer farmer near Fort Brown retains to this day numerous traces of deep wounds inflicted on him when, in his younger days, he attacked and fought with a wolf that had entered his sheep-kraal, and would not have escaped being worried on the spot, unless assistance had arrived in time. These wolves are sometimes caught in large wooden crate-like traps, ten or fifteen feet square, and formed of stout building timber. A bait is affixed at the end opposite to a sliding door, which falls down on the former being loosened. Almost incredible instances are told of their power in crushing and breaking sticks, bending pokers, etc., by their jaws. They live chiefly in caverns and holes in the ground, such as old abandoned antbear runs, but their paws are powerful enough to excavate for dead carcases a considerable depth, and by many they are said to burrow their own holes. The Jacked, or Ca]oe Fox (Cams mesomclas), affords good coursing in open country, and English foxhounds have been