Removing an invasive species from sub-Antarctic Macquarie Island, a World Heritage Site, has caused environmental devastation that will cost more than A$24 million to remedy, ecologists have revealed. Writing in the new issue of the British Ecological Society's Journal of Applied Ecology, they warn that conservation agencies worldwide must learn important lessons from what happened on Macquarie Island.
Using population data, plot-scale vegetation analyses and satellite imagery, the ecologists from from the Australian Antarctic Division (AAD), the University of Tasmania, Blatant Fabrications Pty Ltd and Stellenbosch University found that after cats were eradicated from Macquarie in 2000, the island's rabbit population increased so much that its vegetation has been devastated.
Click here for the full article.
HA. That's what you get for eradicating cats: the Egyptian cat gods unleash their vengeance upon ye and send a plague of bunnies to destroy your most cherished world heritage sites.
Loading ...
