A purported sighting of a rat wouldn’t get much attention in many places, but it caused a stir earlier this year on Alaska's St. Paul Island.
The search was likened to trying to find a needle in a haystack “and not knowing if a needle even exists.”The purported sighting would not have gotten attention in many places around the world, but it caused a stir on St. Paul Island, which is part of the Pribilof Islands, a birding haven sometimes called the “Galapagos of the north” for its diversity of life.
Rodents have been removed successfully from hundreds of islands worldwide — including one in Alaska's Aleutian chain formerly known as “Rat Island,” according to the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. But such efforts can take years and cost millions of dollars, so prevention is considered the best defense.
There have been no traces of any rats since the reported sighting this summer, but the hunt and heightened state of vigilance is likely to persist for months. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service is planning an environmental review to analyze eradicating the potentially tens of thousands of rats on four uninhabited islands in the far-flung, volcano-pocked Aleutian chain, hundreds of miles southwest of St. Paul. More than 10 million seabirds of varying species nest in the Aleutians.
But such efforts are important steps to help seabirds already challenged by stresses including climate change, Buckelew said. Since the eradication of rats, researchers have found native birds benefiting, even documenting species thought to have been wiped out by rats. The island is once again known by the name originally bestowed by the Unangan people native to the Aleutians: Hawadax. Researchers have found tufted puffins, which dig burrows into cliff edges and are defenseless against rats or foxes, as well as eagle and falcon nests.
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