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That's an aspirational goal but there has been no practical methods proposed to actually achieve it. Good intentions are a start I suppose. I don't think anyone really thinks we can do it at this stage. It's openly stated that it would require as-yet unknown technology to achieve.
e.g. We could engineer something to kill possums, but the Aussies are gonna be straight up pissed at us for wiping out their marsupials, if (when) it crosses the ditch.
That's an aspirational goal but there has been no practical methods proposed to actually achieve it.
I would bet that it could be done. It might not be cheap or easy, but I bet that it could be done.
What I am more dubious about is whether:
It can be done at the kind of cost that is considered acceptable by the public. I don't see budget numbers in the article.
It could be done without wiping out other species. One small mammal is much like another small mammal to, say, a poison (which the article is talking about them using today). If you want to wipe out rats without wiping out something else, you're gonna need a pretty darn selective method of killing.
Rats can be kept out once killed off in New Zealand. Rats are pretty much everywhere, and they got there because they're pretty good at hitching rides. I can believe that they might keep them off a small island with little shipping traffic, but the main islands receiving shipments from around the world?
One small mammal is much like another small mammal to, say, a poison
Good news! All other small mammals (other than bats) are also invasive!
Huh, I guess you're right. I'd thought that marsupials had made it to New Zealand, but I was wrong.
a flute!
They can just move New Zealand to Alberta!
Alberta can do it. And it's not even an island. Great podcast about it here: https://pca.st/episode/c7de5849-e857-49b0-bdf0-1e47a9394cc6
There are basically no rats in Alberta, Canada, because the province has been very fastidious about eliminating the few that get in.
That's with major land mass on all sides.
New Zealand is an island and while it's a pretty damn big island that's already a huge step ahead of most places in the world.
I want native New Zealand birds to succeed but this is very clearly a pipedream goal.
All we have to do is convince "alternative medicine" practitioners that rat tails from NZ cure baldness and make your dick grow. They'll be as extinct as the white rhino in less than a decade.
But common animals provide no super powers when you kill and eat them!
Hey but rats and mustelids and possums are exotic to New Zealand!
Nice theory, but when populations start to run low I guarantee these fuckers will just reintroduce them. We’re not talking about people with a lot of scruples here.
Yeah I think "expects" was the wrong word here. We are not on track for doing it within 100 years let alone 27.
Yeah. They'll eliminate all the rats til the next cargo ship arrives.
We won't eliminate them for even a second. The government doesn't fund its conservation department enough to even eradicate all the possums (which don't arrive in cargo) let alone the rats.
New Zealand is 268,021 square kilometres (103,500 miles), the rats are all through it including the parts that are inaccessible to humans.
It's nice that they are at least trying in some places, like in the article.
so they're going to e_rat_icate them?
If Alberta can do it, so can New Zealand.
Unfortunately Alberta started out with the very large advantage of not actually having them, they haven't eradicated them they've just kept them out of the province. Still an impressive and challenging feat but easier than eliminating an established population
Is the Pied Piper still around?
Yes, but he's currently leading Southern "patriots" off a cliff.
Also rats aren’t our only introduced pest. Possums, cats, stoats, dogs, deer, pigs, goats and more. They’ll be harder to get rid of, especially with selfish idiots deliberately reintroducing them so they can keep hunting. Yes, it happens.
I'll make mincemeat out of those extra-large mice!
The headlin made me recall the Great emu war. Hopefully this fairs better
