So I read this morning that a pair of rats can have 5000 offspring in one year. WHAT. WOW. The Norway rats jumped ship many years ago and have systematically eating all the eggs on this island. Thus No birds.
Alaska is working to eradicate the rats so birds can get a foothold back on the island.
http://ap.google.com/article/ALeqM5jt_vMaXClQ1hqGbMd9TtI7fkau1AD8T68VAO2"As far as bird life, it is a dead zone," said Steve Ebbert, a biologist at the Alaska Maritime National Wildlife Refuge, whose 2,500 mostly uninhabited islands include the Aleutian chain, of which Rat Island is a part.
State and federal wildlife biologists are gearing up for an assault on the rats of still-uninhabited Rat Island, hoping to exterminate them with rat poison dropped from helicopters. If they succeed, the birds will sing again on Rat Island. And it will be the third-largest island in the world to be made rat-free.
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