Officials with the Channel Islands National Park announced in May that they believe Anacapa Island is now free of black rats after an eradication project that cost upwards of $1 million. Kate Faulkner, chief of natural resources management at the park, added that it would not be until 2004, however, until biologist could make the official determination that the black rat had been eradicated.
Anacapa Island is an important island for a number of species, including the rare Xantus? murrelet. The murrelet population was threatened by the rats who would eat the murrelet eggs. The rats were introduced to the island sometime before 1940, likely by a wrecked ship.
The American Trader Trustee Council used money it won as compensation for a 1990 oil spill, and which had to be used for restore seabird populations, to pay for the eradication.
But before it could get off the ground, the eradication effort had to overcome opposition from animal rights activists who offered a number of objections to the plan, ranging from claims that the poison to be used was cruel since it kills by causing internal bleeding to claims that a species of deer mice that is found on the island should be declared endangered.
In October 2001 the Fund for Animals and the Channel Islands Animal Protection Association filed a lawsuit arguing that the eradication plan had not adequately taken into account the effects of deer mice and birds eating the poison pellets. That lawsuit was dismissed by a federal court in December 2001 and Phase I of the eradication plan, which targeted the eastern part of the island, was put into effect.
Phase II, which targeted the middle and western part of the island, was conducted last fall.
Source:
Anacapa Island’s black rats killed off. David Montero, Ventura County Star News, May 22, 2003.