Ready to destroy Rat Island rats

2008/01/13 Lakar Iraizoz, Oihane - Elhuyar Zientzia

• Albaitaritza
• Zoologia
• Ingurumena

As elsewhere, Rat Island and the nearby islands are trying to kill the rats. (Photo: Fishing and wildlife service in the USA)

The US government would be very calm if Hamelin's txirulari appeared! Unfortunately, the chirulari of Hamelín is only a story, and the problem in those islands is real. Therefore, the US government is preparing a plan to destroy rats that have caused a massacre in the area.

The Aleutian Islands

The first rats reached the Aleutian islands in the 1780s. They disembarked from a Japanese ship that had been disratified. However, they had no problems adapting. On the one hand, there were neither rat predators on the island. And in the area do not live animals, besides seabirds. Therefore, rats have not been trapped or killed. Moreover, they have become sea bird predators. They eat their eggs, chickens and adult specimens.

In the island chain called aleutiana, a small island and its surroundings are disratified. (Photo: Fishing and wildlife service in the USA)

Therefore, from the moment of their arrival they began to proliferate and proliferate. Given that rats breed between four and six times a year, and that they have between six and twelve offspring in each breeding, it is not difficult to understand how the islands have been built. Among them, most birds in the area have already been killed.

Also, since rats are excellent swimmers, they have had no problem as they have grown to move to nearby islands. Where they arrive they provoke a huge massacre in the ecosystem. In addition to killing birds, deposits are built, they fill the environment with waste and crush the vegetation. They have already entered a dozen islands. A group of Californian researchers say that between 40% and 60% of the missing seabirds and reptiles have been killed by rats, while 90% of these disappearances have occurred on islands.

Deratization

Rats have become predators of island seabirds, which eat eggs, chickens and adult specimens. (Photo: Fishing and wildlife service in the USA)

The US government is very concerned about the problem of rats. To combat it, he has collaborated with several biologists who manage wildlife and have designed a plan. The plan is proposed with two main objectives: one, to end the rats of these islands and another, to raise awareness of the sailors who travel the area of the need to kill the rats they find on board. To carry out their first goal, they plan to provide rats with an anticoagulant poison. They will splash the islands with this poison using helicopters.

On the other hand, to carry out the second objective, 15,000 copies will be distributed among the sailors of a brochure with specific instructions: kill all the rats that observe on the boat, store food and waste in containers that do not reach the rats, do not throw live rats into the water, etc. In case of non-compliance with the request, a prison sentence of one year and a fine of 10,000 dollars will be imposed.

Scientists developing the plan believe that seabirds will return to the island when rats disappear from the islands. They have previously had similar experiences, in New Zealand and Canada, and were the ones that expected results. To see if, once again, they become the only Rat Island rat that gives it its name!

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