South Georgia seabird sanctuary receives £250,000 to eradicate rats

World's largest rat eradication project awarded Defra funding 
February 2012: South Georgia Heritage Trust has been awarded £250,000 of UK Government money to help fund an ambitious rat eradication programme aimed at stopping catastrophic devastation of the island's unique wildlife.

The UK Government Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) grant will help secure the survival of one of the world's most important seabird sanctuaries on the sub Antarctic island of South Georgia.

Ambitious three-year planThe habitat restoration project is an ambitious three-year plan to eradicate rats, which originally arrived on South Georgia as stowaways on sealing and whaling ships, but whose recent population explosion is having a devastating effect on the island's wildlife and ecology, especially its endemic bird populations.

Following years of planning, a highly successful pilot phase of the project was conducted in 2011, which witnessed the successful removal of rats from a tenth of the total infected area. 

The only effective way to eradicate rodents on an island the size of South Georgia is by air and two helicopters were used to deliver the rat bait. It took years of planning, but in just 26 days an 11-strong team of international experts spread 48 tonnes of bait over 128 sq km. 

http://www.wildlifeextra.com/go/news/georgia-sancturary.html

The great South Georgia rat crisis

'Wanted: one Pied Piper for mass rat-luring operation. Must like travel." So might the job description have run for the manager of a major rodent cull planned this year for the remote British territory of South Georgia in the south Atlantic, where rats introduced by whaling ships are wiping out many of the island's 80 bird species.

In the end, the South Georgia Heritage Trust has opted for a rather more failsafe operation: deploying helicopters to scatter tonnes of rat poison across the island in a bid to stop the pests devouring eggs and chicks.

Though the scheme is billed as the largest rat-killing spree ever attempted, it's not the first time this technique has been used. A smaller pilot project was carried out on South Georgia last year, and rats were eliminated in this way on Campbell Island, New Zealand, in 2001. The RSPB also co-managed another cull last year on Henderson Island in the South Pacific; a ship travelled there from Seattle with two helicopters, sailing via several remote atolls, and eradicating bird-killing rats as it went. Who needs the Pied Piper?

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/shortcuts/2012/feb/13/great-south-georgia-rat-crisis

'The Hoff' crab is new ocean find

UK scientists have found prodigious numbers of a new crab species on the Southern Ocean floor that they have dubbed "The Hoff" because of its hairy chest.

The animal was discovered living around volcanic vents off South Georgia.

Great piles of the crabs were seen to come together.

The creature has still to be formally classified, hence the humorous nickname that honours the often bare-chested US actor David Hasselhoff.

It is, however, a type of yeti crab, said Professor Alex Rogers who led the research cruise that found the animal, and it will be given a formal scientific name in due course.

Yeti crabs were first identified in the southern Pacific and are recognised for their hairs, or setae, along their claws and limbs that they use to cultivate the bacteria which they then eat.

But the new species found around the vents that populate the East Scotia Ridge are slightly different in that they exhibit long setae on their ventral surface - on their undersides.

"Their nickname on the cruise ship was the 'Hasselhoff crab', which gives you some idea of what they look like," explained Dr Rogers from Oxford University's Department of Zoology.

"The crab occurs in staggering densities. It is just incredible to see these animals literally lying in heaps around the diffuse flow of these vents.

"In places, they reached as many as 600 individuals per square metre."

The Hoff crab is just one of a number of species new to science to come out of the cruise, which also included researchers from the University of Southampton, the National Oceanography Centre and the British Antarctic Survey.

The team reports novel types of starfish, barnacles, sea anemones, and even an octopus - all living some 2,500m down.

The cruise employed the UK deep-diving robotic submersible, Isis, to investigate the slowly spreading ridge near Antarctica.

It is dotted with hydrothermal vents - cracks in the volcanic rock where mineral-rich, hot waters gush from below the seabed to sustain an extraordinary array of organisms.

By Jonathan AmosScience correspondent, BBC News

Read more at:  http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-16394430

Rodent eradication declared a success in South Georgia

EDITOR'S NOTE: This news story is a couple of months old, but is, we feel, important enough to include anyway...

South Georgia is a remote, inhospitable island clinging on in the southern Atlantic Ocean. Despite the hostile climate, the ocean waters around South Georgia are extremely productive and provide food for millions of sea birds and marine mammals. For the huge numbers of birds that feed in the southern Atlantic, South Georgia is the place they call home. 29 species of bird breed on the island, including the wandering albatross, king penguin and the South Georgia pipit, which is found nowhere else in the world.

Unfortunately South Georgia has been colonised by invasive rodent species. These introduced rodents feed on the eggs and young of ground-nesting native birds, which can offer no resistance. Every year thousands, perhaps millions, of young birds are eaten alive by rats. Rats and mice were first brought to South Georgia by whaling ships in the 19th Century. Since then, with no natural predators, they have proliferated on the island. To see the damage these rodents can do, have a look at ARKive's rather grim, but fascinating video of an introduced rat predating on a Henderson petrel chick. Henderson Island is similar to South Georgia: it is a remote, inhospitable island that supports a high diversity of - often threatened - bird life. On Henderson Island, as on South Georgia, rodents have a devastating impact on native bird populations.

South Georgia Heritage Trust, which is responsible for wildlife conservation on South Georgia, recognises that the only way to ensure the survival of native birds is to fully eradicate rats from the island. Previous research has shown that the only feasible method of eradicating rodents on an island the size of South Georgia - 80,000 hectares - is to spread toxic bait by helicopter. This is a massive undertaking and, if successful, South Georgia will be the largest island ever cleared of rodents. The eradication programme is aided by South Georgia's geography: the island is divided by glaciers into several zones. Rodents can't cross these glaciers, meaning that they will not re-infest baited areas.

The eradication programme began in March and conservationists reported that the first phase has been a success. Around 50 tonnes of rodenticide were spread by helicopter in March, over around 13% of the island. Inspections have found no evidence of live rats in this area - a great outcome. Although some wildlife will inevitably be harmed by the rodenticide, the shape, colour and size of pellets have been carefully designed to minimise their attractiveness to non-rodents.

Read on...