Table of Contents
How did rats get to islands?
They’ve hidden in freight or supply crates or traipsed across rope lines to get into vessels for centuries. They came to Hawaii and New Zealand aboard Polynesian canoes. (We too wondered how large those canoes would have to be for rats to go unnoticed.)
Where did the rats come from on Easter Island and why did they have such a negative effect on the palm tree?
Around 1400 the Easter Island palm became extinct due to overharvesting. Its capability to reproduce has become severely limited by the proliferation of rats, introduced by the islanders when they first arrived, which ate its seeds.
What happened to the rats on Easter Island?
Around 1400 the Easter Island palm became extinct due to overharvesting and as Hunt argues, Polynesian rats, which severely reduced the palm’s capacity to reproduce by eating its seeds.
What is the mystery behind Easter Island?
What purpose do the statues of Easter island Have? Archaeologists suggest that the statues were a representation of the Polynesian people’s ancestors. The Moai statues face away from the sea and towards the villages, by way of watching over the people. So here at Ahu Tongariki these Moai look over a flat village site.
What island has no rats?
South Georgia
Large Island Declared Rat-Free in Biggest Removal Success. South Georgia Island near Antarctica is now teeming with native wildlife, thanks to an effort to remove invasive rats that had been devouring birds.
How did they remove the rats on Rat Island?
The rats arrived on the island before 1780 due to a Japanese shipwreck. In September 2008, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS), in partnership with Island Conservation and The Nature Conservancy eradicated Norway rats with the first aerial application of bait in the State of Alaska.
Why did the trees disappear from Easter Island?
It’s believed the trees were cut down by the ancestors of today’s Easter Islanders in order to transport the giant stone statues – the Moai – as well as to build canoes, houses and fires to burn the dead. When Europeans “discovered” the island during Easter in 1722, there was not a single tree to be seen.
Who made the stone heads of Easter Island?
Rapa Nui people
The island is most famous for its nearly 1,000 extant monumental statues, called moai, which were created by the early Rapa Nui people.
Did the Easter Island heads have bodies?
As a part of the Easter Island Statue Project, the team excavated two moai and discovered that each one had a body, proving, as the team excitedly explained in a letter, “that the ‘heads’ on the slope here are, in fact, full but incomplete statues.”
Do cats eat rats?
Cats are most likely to eat rats when they are hungry. Like their wild ancestors, domestic cats are obligate carnivores, meaning they can only digest meat. Cats with big appetites may, therefore, supplement their daily diet with the occasional rodent or any other small creatures they can catch.