Re: Alaska: Rat Island Rats Eraticated?

Poll

8 votes were received.
All visitors can vote.

Were the Rat Island rats all exterminated?

	Yes, it could happen!
	Not a chance

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Interesting attempt to eliminate an invasive alien species (aside: California History buffs will know that the shipborne Norway rat is also the presumed vector for introducing the plague bacterium into wild California rodent populations probably in the 19th century):


http://www.reuters.com/article/latestCrisis/idUSN12456813
Alaska's Rat Island rat-free after 229 years

ANCHORAGE, Alaska, June 12 (Reuters) - Alaska's Rat Island is finally rat-free, 229 years after a Japanese shipwreck spilled rampaging rodents onto the remote Aleutian island, decimating the local bird population.

After dropping poison onto the island from helicopter-hoisted buckets for a week and a half last autumn, there are no signs of living rats and some birds have returned, according to the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.
......

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The cure for a fallacious argument is a better argument, not the suppression of ideas.
-- Carl Sagan

Anyone have a conditions report for Tuolumne Meadows area? I might go up there this weekend. Thanks in advance.

I've reached my quota for the week - someone else take this one.

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Vince
Anyone have a conditions report for Tuolumne Meadows area? I might go up there this weekend. Thanks in advance.

Are you bringing rats? Or just trying to be blatant about hijacking a thread?

Quote
eeek

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Vince
Anyone have a conditions report for Tuolumne Meadows area? I might go up there this weekend. Thanks in advance.

Are you bringing rats?

Don't forget their leashes:
http://www.petco.com/Shop/Product.aspx?familyID=10498&AID=10412456&PID=1333351&URL=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.petco.com%2FShop%2FProduct.aspx%3FfamilyID%3D10498&cm_mmc=CJ-_-CID-_-1333351-_-10412456

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Vince
Anyone have a conditions report for Tuolumne Meadows area? I might go up there this weekend. Thanks in advance.

I think you meant to go to THIS thread:

http://yosemitenews.info/forum/read.php?1,13304



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 06/12/2009 10:21PM by Bee.

Will Goat Island be next?

The plot thickens:

http://www.scientificamerican.com/blog/60-second-science/post.cfm?id=did-the-rat-island-restoration-effo-2009-06-12

Last year, one of the world’s most aggressive island restoration projects was launched to poison all the invasive rats on Alaska’s Rat Island, located in the western part of the Aleutian islands. But the extermination project may have taken an unexpected toll: a recent survey of the island recovered the corpses of 41 bald eagles and 186 glaucous-winged gulls – raising the possibility that the birds died after consuming poisoned rats......


further stories on invasive species extermination efforts:
http://www.scientificamerican.com/blog/60-second-science/post.cfm?id=saving-wildlife-by-killing-it

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The cure for a fallacious argument is a better argument, not the suppression of ideas.
-- Carl Sagan



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 06/12/2009 10:49PM by Frank Furter.

Quote
eeek
Will Goat Island be next?

Since you asked, check out goats behaving badly:

http://www.darwinfoundation.org/en/our-work/featured-projects/project-isabela

and some of the control methods involving "Judas" goats:

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The cure for a fallacious argument is a better argument, not the suppression of ideas.
-- Carl Sagan



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 06/13/2009 12:56PM by Frank Furter.

They are going to bring in hungry cougars.

Jim

Quote
eeek
Will Goat Island be next?

There are no goats on "Goat Island".
The real Goat Island isn't even really an Island it's more of an Isthmus... located in
beautiful Loch Tablae!

Regarding the "rats"... (and I didn't read any of the accompanying materials):
If it looks like rat and smells like a rat ... It's probably a rat

(yeah, you'll probably have to really read into this to have any idea what I'm saying)
(but I refuse to post in the Half Dome thread... argh! enough of Half Dome!)

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bill-e-g
There are no goats on "Goat Island".

Which Goat Island would that be?

Quote
eeek

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bill-e-g
There are no goats on "Goat Island".

Which Goat Island would that be?

Dat be "Bill-e-Goat Island/Isthmus" on beeee-A-U-teee-ful Loch Tablae

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bill-e-g
Dat be "Bill-e-Goat Island/Isthmus" on beeee-A-U-teee-ful Loch Tablae

I've heard things about that "island" that can't be repeated here.

Update on the Rat Island situation:

http://www.adn.com/news/alaska/wildlife/story/908849.html

WASHINGTON -- After two centuries of an epic infestation, Alaska's Rat Island may finally merit a name change.

The island, 1,300 miles west of Anchorage in the Aleutian chain, appears to be pest-free for the first time since rats overran it after a Japanese sailing ship wrecked there in the late 1700s.

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The cure for a fallacious argument is a better argument, not the suppression of ideas.
-- Carl Sagan

What WAS that word?

Crumudgeon

Maybe in two weeks I'll take the there and bask in it's glory.
Never been to Saddle Horse... need to knock that one off the list...

Indeed!

e-RAT-icated

HAHAHAHA! I'm the only one that got the answer right!
(uh... I just voted.. and I didn't look at the answer... no, seriously, I didn't)
(birds honour)

(ok... really I just wanted to get my new "signature" in)

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