In Sierra Leone, Soldiers and fire fighters had been dispatched from the capital Freetown to flood out the dangerous snakes.
Where as, in Alaska a coalition of federal and state wildlife officials, scientists, and conservationists has formed in an attempt to rid Rat Island of its rodent infestation.
Rat Island
ANCHORAGE, Alaska: It will be the third-largest and the northernmost island rat eradication ever attempted.
And if it works, it could lay the groundwork for helping other nearby islands that are currently overrun with various species of the genus Rattus.
- It is expected, 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.
- Rats have ruled the island since 1780, when they jumped off a sinking Japanese ship and terrorized all but the largest birds on the island. The incident introduced the non-native Norway rat also known as the brown rat to Alaska.
- The $2.5 million Rat Island eradication project, a joint effort between the U.S. federal government, the Nature Conservancy and Island Conservation, is one of the world's most ambitious attempts to remove destructive alien species from an island.
- Now there are signs that several species of birds, including Aleutian cackling geese, ptarmigan, peregrine falcons and black oystercatchers, are starting to nest again on the 10-square-mile (26-sq-km) island.
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