Balance of nature: importance of ecosystems (Introduction)

by David Turell , Tuesday, September 06, 2022, 18:17 (808 days ago) @ David Turell

Damage by imported feral cats in Australia:

https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-019-02001-z?utm_source=Nature+Briefing&utm_c...

"Millions of feral cats roam Australia, where they grow fat and sleek on a diet that includes large helpings of native mammals. Now, Brett Murphy at Charles Darwin University in Darwin, Australia, and a large cast of co-authors have combined estimates of cat prevalence with surveys of mammalian remains in cat poo and stomachs to estimate the total number of their prey.

Now implant a poison pill is tried:

https://www.newscientist.com/article/2336375-making-australias-native-animals-poisonous...

"An implant that makes Australian animals lethally poisonous to cats that prey on them could help save species on the verge of extinction.

"The rice-sized implant is inert when it is inserted under the native mammal’s skin at the back of the neck. If a cat eats the mammal, it is likely to swallow the implant, because cats usually eat the whole bodies of their prey. Once the cat ingests the implant, the acid inside the cat’s stomach breaks it open and releases a fatal poison.

***

"The poison – sodium fluoroacetate, or “1080” – leads to unconsciousness then death in cats by causing an energy shutdown in their cells. It is already widely used in poison baits for feral cats because it is relatively non-toxic to native animals, so it shouldn’t harm other predators that may end up consuming the implant. This is because sodium fluoroacetate naturally occurs in many Australian plants and native animals have evolved resistance to it.

"In an unpublished laboratory trial, feral cats were given rabbit carcasses that each contained one of the rice-sized implants. The cats all died within 6 to 12 hours of consuming the carcasses, seemingly in a relatively painless way. “They just kind of curl up and slow down,” says Blencowe.

"In a subsequent unpublished field trial in 2021, the researchers inserted the implants under the skin of 30 native bilbies at a large wildlife reserve in South Australia where feral cats are also present. Bilbies are small, furry, long-eared marsupials that are threatened by cat predation.

"Unfortunately for the researchers, the trial coincided with a mouse plague that created so much food for the cats that they didn’t try to eat any of the bilbies. “But at least all the bilbies survived fine, so that tells us the implants are safe,” says Blencowe."

Comment: Australia is still the best example of how humans destory ecosystems.