Bavarian Pine Vole
Our final day of Rodent Week takes us to densely-populated Europe, where the Bavarian Pine Vole was thought to be extinct. In fact, this gorgeous rendering of the vole was produced by Peter Schouten for A Gap in Nature: Discovering the World’s Extinct Animals, with text by Tim Flannery (Atlantic Monthly Press, 2001). One of three vole species that evolved after the glaciation of the last ice age split a single population into isolated groups, Microtus bavaricus was thought to be extinct after the last sighting of it in 1962: By the 1980s, its last known Bavarian meadow was paved over and turned into a hospital. But testing done in 2000 revealed that an existing vole population in the northern Tyrol, near the border between Germany and Austria, was in fact the Bavarian Pine Vole. Around the same time, an Austrian researcher at Vienna’s Natural History Museum, Frederike Spitzenberger, discovered individuals belonging to the Tyrol population in live traps she had placed in the area, and genetic testing has determined that they are, indeed, members of the species once believed to be extinct. She told a newspaper: “All the voles look like sausages with four legs. They all have tiny ears and short tails. You have to look at their teeth to tell them apart. But the only real way to tell is to examine the genetics.”
Now listed as Critically Endangered by the IUCN, the vole occupies a single alpine site of mixed forest which may be threatened by habitat loss due to changes in landscape use. Despite the E.U.’s commitment to biodiversity programs such as the Natura 2000 Network, there is currently no conservation management plan for the vole. Yet Spitzenberger remains “optimistic,” telling The Guardian in 2004, “The mouse is extremely rare. Probably only a few hundred of them exist. We now have to make sure that they don’t die out.”
Illustration: Peter Schouten
Smoky Mouse
Rodent Week continues on the Dry Continent: With fewer than 2,500 individuals left in the wild, this endemic Australian mouse illustrates the peril facing many of unique species Down Under. Introduced predators (particularly feral cats, foxes, and wild dogs), changes to native plant communities, logging, and loss of habitat to development have all taken their toll on the Smoky Mouse since Europeans arrived.
Fortunately, FAME—the Foundation for Australia’s Most Endangered Species—is working with local environmental agencies and researchers to shore up the Smoky Mouse and other endangered Australian rodents. They engage in vital educational work, providing this list of facts about the crucial role played by rodents in the ecosystem:
- they are important in the life cycle of many native plants
- they help spread the seeds of fruiting plants
- like Potoroos and Bandicoots, native rodents help keep eucalyptus and other trees healthy by spreading the spores of fungal species that these native plants need to survive
- they are a major food for quolls, owls and other native predators
- native mice are never pests like the introduced mouse, and they do not exist outside natural habitats
- native rodents are a key part of every type of Australian habitat: on the ground, in the trees, and in the water
- native rodents do not transmit diseases to humans like introduced species
- at least eight species of native Australian rodent are extinct, and the majority of south-eastern species are rare or endangered
FAME is also helping to establish colonies of the Smoky Mouse and other endangered rodents at Waratah Park Sanctuary in New South Wales, providing local schools with native rodent breeding kits, and monitoring populations in the wild. To help FAME help the Smoky Mouse, consider a donation or a membership.
Photo: Linda Broome
Yes, It’s Rodent Week!
Why Rodent Week, you might ask? Despite being well-mannered and attractive—I once knew a fine fellow named Ralph, who just happened to be a rat—rodents are too-often despised for their prolific nature and a reputation for spreading disease. But in their native ecosystems, rodents play a critical role, serving as a prey base for carnivorous mammals and birds, spreading the seeds of plants far and wide, and aerating and improving soil. A recent study by a team from the University of Tokyo found that rodents promote ecosystem restoration in harsh, arid lands. The researchers asked: “Are small rodents key promoters of ecosystem restoration in harsh environments?” and in a paper published in 2009 in the Journal of Arid Environments, the answer was yes. Mongolian gerbils, the team found, provided a valuable service by removing plant litter and breaking up a crust that formed across the top of degraded agricultural fields, preventing the growth of a native grass species. They concluded that “small rodents are key agents in the recovery of degraded grasslands.”
While the Golden (or Syrian) Hamster is commonly kept as a pet and used in medical research, the species is threatened in the wild, listed as Vulnerable on the IUCN Red List. Routinely poisoned by farmers (with rodenticide supplied by the Syrian government) and losing habitat to agriculture and development, the golden hamster occupies a shrinking, fragmented range along the border between Syria and Turkey. Should these hamsters become extinct in the wild, their key role as seed dispersers will come to an end, doubtless affecting native plants in the region. According to the IUCN, no conservation measures are in place, and Syria considers the species an agricultural pest.
Photo: © Robert Pickett / papiliophotos.com
Malagasy Giant Jumping Rat
It’s Rodent Week: The largest rodent in Madagascar, the Malagasy giant jumping rat might be mistaken for a rabbit, hopping around the dry tropical forest floor on its hind legs and living in burrows underground. But like so many of this island nation’s unique, endemic creatures, the giant jumping rat, or Votsovotsa, is threatened. The rat is described as endangered on the IUCN Red List, and its remaining habitat along the island’s west coast has been split into two dwindling and isolated patches by deforestation and development. Its total range now covers a mere 77 square miles, and a related species went extinct several thousand years ago. The population has been driven to historic lows, probably below 8,000, by feral dogs, and a recent study predicted that the species would be extinct in the wild within 24 years unless measures were taken to stop it.
In 1990, however, Gerald Durrell began a captive-breeding program with five individuals. The giant jumping rats are monogamous, staying with their mates for life, or until a mate is lost to a predator, often a fossa (a cat-like member of the civet family, also endemic to Madagascar) or a Madagascar ground boa: The rats routinely block up the entrances to their burrows with dirt and leaves to discourage entrance by snakes or other predators. In captivity, however, they have done well. In addition to the Durrell Wildlife Conservation Trust, there are now a dozen institutions with successful captive-breeding programs. An excellent place to see the species in Madagascar is Kirindy, a protected area and research center on the western coast. For more on this distinctive rat, see “The Giant Jumping Rat, Another Peculiarity from Madagascar,” by Rhett Butler of Mongabay.
Photo: Piotr Lukasik, WildMadagascar.org
Salt Marsh Harvest Mouse
Continuing with Rodent Week here on iWild, we turn to the Salt Marsh Harvest Mouse, listed as Endangered on the IUCN’s Red List. This mouse is a salt specialist, capable of swimming through marshes as well as drinking salt water and consuming plants with considerable salt content, including glasswort and pickleweed. Endemic to the San Francisco Bay area, the two subspecies of this mouse play an integral role in the salt marsh habitat of the Bay area. But as the marshes were destroyed in past decades—by commercial salt harvesting, pollution, and development—the mouse has declined drastically as its habitat has become fragmented. The species now occupies less than 200 square miles.
“Nancy Pelosi’s Mouse”: To add insult to injury, the mouse has fallen victim to the poisonous partisan politics surrounding endangered species protection in the U.S. In 2009, Republicans Mike Pence (Indiana) and Dan Lungren (California) got up on their hind legs, trying to derail the 2009 Economic Stimulus package by claiming that $30 million would go to “San Francisco mice.” In fact, the $30 million was targeted at wetlands restoration around the Bay, a crucial flood-control initiative and the largest restoration project on the west coast, aimed at restoring 15,100 acres of industrial salt ponds. The South Bay Salt Pond Restoration Project is a highly-regarded scientific effort which has generated jobs along with new economic and recreational opportunities. The Republicans’ false claim was debunked by Jackie Speier, a Representative from San Francisco, who pointed out in the San Francisco Chronicle that the mouse lives “everywhere around the Bay except San Francisco.” But, as David Frum pointed out, “the problem with the story is not that it was false. The problem with the story is that it was stupid.”
Hope & Despair in Conservation
Brian Horne, a postdoctoral fellow at the San Diego Zoo’s Institute for Conservation Research, has written a fascinating blog post on the issue of despair in conservation. Horne works on red-crowned roof turtle conservation projects in India which monitor populations and seek to improve survival-rates for captive-raised turtle and gharial crocodile hatchlings. (See iWild’s January 7 entry for more on the gharial). The project has also broken ground on an education center, located next to its turtle hatcheries, to provide training for forest rangers and “reformed turtle poachers.”
Yet Horne was recently told by a colleague that “my turtle conservation projects in Asia, specifically India, have little chance of long-term success and that they were foolishly impractical.” The assumption that these endangered species would go extinct no matter what was done for them, Horne writes, left him “dumbfounded.” Yet, he acknowledges, such despondency is now commonplace within the conservation movement, as scientists grow overwhelmed by bad news and the idea that ” our conservation efforts are merely postponing the inevitable mass extinction of countless plant and animal species.”
Happily, Horne is not persuaded by despair. I’m not either. While I’m hardly a sunny optimist in general, five years of reporting for Rewilding the World: Dispatches from the Conservation Revolution left me convinced that conservation is making a difference. I also believe, along with Horne, that just because we broke it doesn’t mean we can’t fix it: “Call me young and naïve,” he writes, “but I still think we can make a difference and that small actions today can have long-term positive conservation impacts.”
~ Caroline Fraser
It Ought to be Prairie Dog Day!
Rodent Week continues on iWild, moving the spotlight to the Gunnison’s Prairie Dog, one of five species of prairie dog in North America that is edging ever-closer to extinction. Like the Passenger Pigeon, prairie dogs once numbered in the millions across the U.S. Now, due to poisoning programs, widespread extirpation across much of their range, uncontrolled hunting, and plague, the Gunnison’s is limited to small pockets. The Bush Administration refused to consider listing this or any other prairie dog species on the Endangered Species List, and President Obama’s Interior Secretary, Ken Salazar, a fifth-generation Colorado rancher, has expressed his disdain for listing in the past.
The prairie dog is considered a “keystone” species by conservation biologists: It plays an important role in arid grassland ecosystems by constructing elaborate tunnels underground that funnel water to the water table. Its burrows and tunnels create a home for many other species, including burrowing owls, snakes, and other rodents; its digging aerates the soil and some ungulate species have been shown to graze preferentially around prairie dog holes, attracted to the mix of native grass species growing there.
While the IUCN Red List identifies only the Mexican species of prairie dog as endangered, that may change: Many environmental groups in the U.S. are pressing for several species to be protected under the ESA, particularly the Gunnison’s and the Utah, or white-tailed prairie dog. For more information, see WildEarth Guardians’ third annual Report from the Burrow, which gives most of the states in the west a failing grade, or a “D” in prairie dog management. The Guardians are also lobbying to declare February 2nd Prairie Dog Day in the West, something which iWild warmly recommends.
Photo: Caroline Fraser
It’s Rodent Week on iWild!
This week we’re featuring the world’s endangered rodents. Today: The Southern Giant Slender-Tailed Cloud Rat, endemic to the Philippines, is a large, shy, squirrel-like creature with big feet and a furry tail. Largely nocturnal, this rat frequents the tops of forest trees and is found only on the southern half of Luzon Island and one other island. It bears only a single pup a year. Threatened by a slow reproduction rate and by heavy and unsustainable hunting—some residents claim to catch 50 of the rats a year—the species may also be endangered by extensive deforestation. ARKive and the World Wildlife Fund are urging that the largest remaining remnant of the southern Luzon rain forests near Mount Isarog be protected: The region contains 13 mammal species listed as threatened on the IUCN Red List, including the Southern Giant Slender-Tailed Cloud Rat, as well as the largest bat on earth, the golden-crowned flying-fox.
Photo: © Daniel Heuclin / www.nhpa.co.uk
Panamanian Golden Frog:
Wrapping up our first month of Endangered Species All-Stars on iWild is the Panamanian Golden Frog, which is, in fact, a toad. Last filmed in the wild for BBC’s 2008 Life in Cold Blood series, this extraordinary poison toad—endemic to Panama—secretes a water-soluble neurotoxin known as zetekitoxin. It may be extinct in the wild; individuals have been collected in an effort to breed them for reintroduction. As it stands, however, deforestation and water pollution—which spread the deadly fungal infection chytridiomycosis—drove the population to a steep decline of over 80% in only a decade. The IUCN attributes much of that decline to the 2003 construction of a road along a ridge of the Cordillera Central, just one example of the pernicious effects that roads can have on endangered species, opening the way for people and pathogens.
Grey-Headed Flying Fox
SAVE THEM ALL: Today’s Endangered species is an All-Star Pollinator, vulnerable like so many threatened bats around the world. On a trip to Sydney in 2000, we saw these flying foxes streaming out of the Royal Botanic Gardens near the Opera House and spreading across the sky at dusk, an extraordinary vision. Like so many other species in Australia, however, this fruit bat has been demonized by farmers and fruit-growers, angry about decimated crops, and by communities appalled at the commotion and guano deposits around large colonies. Even the Botanic Gardens objected, despite the fact that there was evidence of bats in the area since the 1800s. With bat numbers reaching a high of 22,000 in the Gardens in 2008—causing severe damage to the scientific plant collection and surrounding landscape—it was decided to employ a non-lethal noise-disturbance program to encourage the colony to relocate, something that had been done successfully in Melbourne’s Botanic Gardens. Recorded sounds of chainsaws, hedge trimmers, tractors, and other heavy machinery will be directed at the colony, proven to encourage the bats to move on. For more on the Botanic Gardens’ bat relocation effort, see their Frequently Asked Questions page.
Loss of habitat was undoubtedly behind the bats’ recolonization of the Gardens. As forests have fallen to development and agriculture in Australia, the flying fox population, which once numbered in the millions on the continent, has been sharply reduced, perhaps by as much as 30% in the past few decades. Tens of thousands have died during successive heat waves, with 4,000 alone falling out of the trees in Melbourne in February, 2009, a month when 173 people died in the worst bush fires Australia had ever seen.
Fortunately, the grey-headed flying fox—an extraordinarily charismatic species—has good friends in Australia. Protected under federal and state law, listed as Vulnerable on the IUCN Red List, roosting sites are now legally protected in New South Wales and Queensland. And communities are beginning to see that large colonies may become tourist attractions on their own. A recent cover article by Roy Hunt in Australian Geographic describes how the town of Bellingen—once adamantly opposed to the foxes’ colonization of nearby Bellingen Island Reserve—has, at long last, begun to make a kind of peace with the 80,000 furry specimens in their backyard. Fruit growers have protected their crops with nets, and some residents have warmed to the foxes after seeing intimate photographs taken by wildlife photographer Vivien Jones of mother foxes with their young, known as “littlies” or “jockeys,” who cling to mum’s fur as she flies. To see these images, check out Jones’ website, Flying Foxes on Bellingen Island. The article also recommends a book by Bellingen ecologist Ross Macleay, Nature Culture (North Bank Institute) available on Scribd, a searching examination of the intricate philosophical and physical difficulties of ecological restoration.
