"Jumpin' Jackrabbits: The Drive to Control Longears"

A Moment in Time

Kansas Historical Society

March 1998

A monthly series from the Kansas Historical Society

Yonder against the hill I see them,

Their running bodies grayish brown

Amid the thickening clouds of dust!

A thousand, two thousand, maybe more

They dart against the closing lines

Of men and women, children, armed

With clubs, a swiftly closing ring.

Some crouch down behind a weed

Too small to hide them from the throng

Who're striking right and left, killing

Or stunning and going on to others.

A few escape--out through the mob

A moment more the rest remain

Tired from running, some blood stained,

And when they pause one sees their eyes;

They show no fear, instead there's something

That makes one wonder, later--not now,

There's not time now, one has to kill.

The dust is clearing, their bodies strewn

The ground, a few are kicking yet,

One squeals as it receives a final blow.

The rabbit drive is over.

Kansas Magazine published Ethel Harkness's "Rabbit Drive" in 1936 at a time when the Great Depression, the Dust Bowl, and the record-setting summer temperatures of the 1930s were all at their peak. If the low prices, the blowing topsoil, the blistering summers, and the drought weren't enough, western Kansas in the mid-thirties was plagued with hoards of Lepus californicus melanotis, black-tailed jackrabbits. Reminiscent of the grasshoppers sixty years earlier, the rabbits ate everything in their path, including the roots of plants. Those few farmers who eked out crops watched as the rabbits demolished their livelihood.

Kansans had hunted rabbits for meat and sport from the territorial period, and newspapers in the 1890s carried articles on a coursing meet in Chase County. In earlier years rabbits had been a blessing in western Kansas, providing meat for the new settlers.

The warm weather of the early 1930s coupled with the lack of rainfall eliminated many of the natural conditions that killed young rabbits. By 1935 the Wichita Beacon estimated there were eight million rabbits in thirty western Kansas counties. The worst years were 1934 and 1935. Desperate farmers called them "Hoover hogs." The rabbits were eating what few crops had survived, depriving cattle of badly needed feed.

Jackrabbits are migratory, will eat plants, and then dig and eat the roots. Adults are capable of producing three to eight offspring every thirty-two days.

Several counties tried offering bounties of one to four cents per rabbit, but Hodgeman County stopped paying bounties at forty-four thousand rabbits when the cost became more than the county could bear. Strapped farmers couldn't afford to waste precious ammunition shooting them.

Drives to control the rabbit population were tried as early as the turn of the century, so the idea was not a new one by the 1930s. Drives were often held on Sunday afternoons in the late winter or early spring, with February and March being the most popular months. Drives were advertised in newspapers and on handbills in neighboring counties.

Several county commissions purchased fencing. Other groups such as county farm bureaus, chambers of commerce, and local newspapers lent support.

The size of a drive varied from one or two sections to massive efforts several miles square. The largest successful drive was near Dighton and involved ten thousand people in an area eight miles square that netted an estimated thirty-five thousand rabbits. An even larger drive near Kalvesta was to have been ten miles square or sixty-four thousand acres. The organizers expected as many as fifteen thousand people to assist, but a dust storm ended the drive prematurely when the opposing sides couldn't find each other. Similarly, the weather ruined a planned 108-section drive near Oakley.

At the beginning of the drive, people lined up about every twenty to thirty feet along the four sides of a square and made noise as they walked. Often there were two lines on each side with women and children behind the front line in cars and trucks blowing horns, pounding on pans, or anything else to scare rabbits ahead.

A fenced area in the center was the object of the drive. The size of the enclosure varied from about seventy-five feet square to as large as forty acres. People closed in toward it, coming closer together all the time. By the time they reached the enclosure, people were shoulder to shoulder, blocking all possible paths of escape.

The rabbits were clubbed in the fenced enclosure. Usually the fences were six feet high to prevent all escape. Firearms were strictly forbidden, lest participants injure each other.

Stories about the drives appeared in regional newspapers in the Midwest, and it caused an outrage as many people thought the rabbits were being hunted for sport rather than population control. Farmers emphasized the destruction the rabbits were causing to their crops and livestock. Eastern Kansans, where there were no jackrabbits, were among the critics, prompting some farmers to propose that the rabbits be driven to the eastern part of the state. The Kansas Forestry, Fish and Game Commission called drives "unsportsman-like and cruel" but had no authority to intervene. Farmers felt they needed the drives to survive. Some counties had several drives a week.

The farmers tried to ship live rabbits to eastern states, but Ohio game and wildlife officials realized how destructive jackrabbits were and canceled their order. Residents of western Kansas rounded up about twelve hundred live rabbits to ship to Indiana; the press in Kansas City, Omaha, and Denver as well as the Pathe newsreel company covered this attempt.

Cattlemen estimated that feed for 200,000 cattle was saved by these attempts to control the jackrabbit.

The remains of the rabbits were used as feed for other animals. Relatively few were eaten by humans because of the fear of a disease known as "rabbit fever," introduced into the rabbit population earlier in the 1930s. Some were sold as pelts for about three cents each.

Rabbit drives were a means by which farmers could directly improve their economic condition, which was being attacked by a variety of destructive forces in the mid-1930s. Though gruesome by today's standards, the drives fostered a sense of community and offered an outlet for the frustrations that farmers experienced during the worst years of the Dust Bowl and the Depression.

These and other resources on Kansas history can be found in the Center for Historical Research at the Kansas History Center, headquartered in Topeka. The History Center, open 9:00 a.m. - 4:30 p.m. Monday through Saturday, is located at 6425 SW Sixth Avenue, Topeka, KS 66615; 785-272-8681; TTY 785-272-8683; http://www.kshs.org

The Kansas Historical Society does not discriminate on the basis of disability in admission to, access to, or operation of its programs. The Society requests prior notification to accommodate individuals with special needs or disabilities.

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