Urge Feds to Scrap Mass Poisoning on South Farallon Islands

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BACKGROUND

The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) is accepting public comments on its proposed plan to drop poison pellets from helicopters in an attempt to eradicate mice from the South Farallon Islands. The FWS claims that this mass poisoning initiative is needed to keep owls—who are apparently drawn to the islands because of the rodent population—away from protected storm-petrel birds, yet eradicating rodents will not keep predators away from birds, so this management strategy is horribly flawed. Your voice is needed!

Poisons cause immense suffering: Victims experience convulsions, vomiting, internal bleeding, gradual cardiac collapse, and a variety of other reactions that result in horrific pain and a slow, agonizing death that can take days. Not only is this method exceedingly cruel, it is also indiscriminate, posing a danger to birds, other mammals, and aquatic life. In fact, the Environmental Protection Agency banned brodifacoum and other rodenticides for consumer use because of their extreme toxicity to wildlife. 


WHOM TO CONTACT

Please follow this link and ask the FWS not to poison rodents on the South Farallon Islands and to choose the “No Action” alternative instead. Comments must be received by September 30 at 11:59 p.m. EDT. And please forward this message widely!


SAMPLE COMMENT

To Whom It Concerns,

I’m writing today to ask that you forgo the use of poisons for rodent control on the South Farallon Islands. Poisons cause immense suffering: Victims experience convulsions, vomiting, internal bleeding, gradual cardiac collapse, and a variety of other reactions that result in horrific pain and a slow, agonizing death that can take days. Not only is this method exceedingly cruel, it is also indiscriminate, posing a danger to birds, other mammals, and aquatic life, including protected species. The Environmental Protection Agency banned brodifacoum and other rodenticides for consumer use because of their extreme toxicity to wildlife. Rodents also pose no direct risk to storm-petrels and resorting to eradication in lieu of other management methods fails to follow the Fish and Wildlife Service’s mandate to use the best available science.

Please forgo the poisoning of mice and other wildlife on the South Farallon Islands and choose the “No Action” alternative instead.

NAME


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humans,
you consider we mice
to be pests,
so you drop deadly poisons
onto us and other animals
and their nests.
birds you will kill slowly,
and of course, us too.
you would not want this
to happen to you.
so please let nature
do what is meant.
and stay away from our
islands,
and let no poison pellets
be sent.

signed,
the mice and other residents of the south farallon islands

Karen Lyons Kalmenson