Comment by tokenadult | Hacker News Reader

Comment by tokenadult | Hacker News Reader

The introduced rats were a foodstuff for the Polynesian sailors who brought them to New Zealand.[1] The article mentions the exception of the bats, [edit (thanks!): and mentions stoats and ferrets being released to hunt rabbits, without specifically mentioning how the stoats] got to New Zealand. Looking up the issue,[2] it appears that several of the nastiest invasive species on New Zealand were brought in to be hunted for sport, which has turned out to be a mistake.

Where I live in central North America, I have seen and heard coyote quite near by, and I'm glad they are here, as they help cull the deer, which I have also seen at very close range in my neighborhood. (Once my third son and I happened to meet going opposite directions on our city trail just where my son had noticed a magnificent eight-point buck calmly browsing in the restored wild swamp alongside the trail.) Here it is actually important to kill native deer, as deer are the most lethal wild animal in the United States today.[3]

[1] http://www.doc.govt.nz/Documents/about-doc/concessions-and-p...

[2] http://www.teara.govt.nz/en/1966/mammals-introduced

[3] http://reason.com/archives/2001/11/21/north-americas-most-da...

Nope, only the Polynesian rat, kiore, was the foodstuff introduced by Maori. The other two species were stowaways.

Incidentally. the kiore is now endangered due to being outcompeted by the other rat species.

The article suggests that stoats were brought over to try to control the rabbit population. A real forehead-slapper...

Well, mustelids worked well for rabbits in England. And to be fair, ferrets (they introduced stoats, weasels and ferrets) do spend most of their time in the grasslands preying on rabbits. It's the stoats and weasels that really devastate the birds. The 1080 drops for rodents works on well on mustelids too, as they tend to eat the dead bodies, and 1080 bioaccumulates.

But yeah, in hindsight, thanks guys. But at least they didn't get around to introducing dingoes from Australia to control the possums as proposed.

Their neighbours the Australians brought in the cane toad (Rhinella marina) to control the cane beetle.

Rabbits, foxes, water buffalo, camels..... the list is quite long, take your pick:

http://www.environment.gov.au/biodiversity/invasive-species/...

I've never been able to find the footage again, but it was quite something - arid scrubland in the foreground, rabbit-proof fence across the middle, and orange sand from there to the horizon. On the other side of the fence was a boiling mass of furry bodies; rabbits trying to get into the scrub.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com