Pacific island taken over by ‘alien’ snakes and 700 million spiders | World | News

A small US Island region in the Western Pacific Ocean was once known for its live forests and various bird life, but now every bird and a spider population in its forests are suffering from an invading snake population 40 times higher than the neighboring islands. Today, Guam has become the central base of one of the most severe ecological disruptions in the recent history thanks to the brown tree snake (Boiga Iregularis).

This invading reptiles were mistakenly introduced by military cargo shipments after the World War II, and since then he changed the balance of Guam’s ecosystems. Now around two million, brown tree snakes spread to the island, birds, mammals, other reptiles and even 168,000 powerful population left on the human scrap left aggressively. 10 of the 12 domestic bird species, which were once common in the forests of Guam, disappeared. The remaining two stay away from natural habitats in caves and scattered urban areas. Today, the forests of the island suffers from a spooky bird lack of birds and out of control insect population, because there is no bird to control.

In 2018, Haldre Rogers, a researcher who has been an ecologist in Virginia Tech, who has been studying the ecology of the island for more than twenty years, witnessed the brown tree snake first. He attended a meeting in Guam, where a roasted pig remained unattended. When the guests returned, a brown tree snake wrapped around the meat and swallowed large pieces of meat.

When a few predators remained, reptiles shifted their diets to include small mammals, other reptile species, and even each other. Southern Plains Land Trust’s general manager and former researcher Henry Pollock in Guam said that snakes were those who do not discriminate and consume animals in almost their size.

In a recent study near the Andersen Air Force Base, Mrs. Rogers and her team watched Young Såli, a forest Starling species that managed to survive. Surprisingly, the team found that the radio donors they used were in their snake stomachs. However, it was the fact that it was even more disturbing that the ones were dead, that the snake was covered in saliva, but not defeated. In about half of the cases, birds were very large to swallow – the snakes killed them and then moved to their next target.

In the meantime, when the birds go, the forest itself begins to change, many indigenous tree species are struggling to reproduce. Approximately 70% of Guam’s local trees rely on birds to distribute seeds. Now, the fruits fall to the ground and decayable or seeds cannot germinate due to the lack of weak growth conditions under the main trees.

Nevertheless, it was a remarkable beneficiary of Guam’s snake invasion.

In most of the Mariana Islands, there are relatively few spider with a major increase in the rain season. However, in Guam, in the forests throughout the year, banana spiders and hunter spiders (Heteropoda venatoria) and tent-web spiders.

“When walking, it is common for the front person to buy a spider bar and to destroy the nets,” while walking. ” He said.

The surveys were found between 508 million and 733 million spiders, about 40 times more than neighboring islands such as island, route, Tinian and Saipan. These figures include spiders only in 6.6 feet of the floor, ie the actual number can be significantly higher. In total, it is believed to have an equal number of legs living in the forests of Guam.

Despite decades of control efforts, including research on traps, chemical repellents and even species, but also have not been damaged by the others, dozens of control efforts – Guam’s brown tree snake population continues to grow. The US government, which has been controlling the island since 1899, is currently spending about $ 3.8 million (£ 2.8 million) per year for snake control in Guam. The US Department of Agriculture uses Sniffer dogs to cut brown tree snakes to Guam’s ports and airports and prevent them from escaping to other islands with healthy bird populations.

One of the several influential strategies at the Andersen Air Force Base has seen paracetamol, which was fed with acetaminofen or fatal and brown tree snakes. To prevent re -emergence, the area was surrounded by a snake -proof fence. In this protected region, the number of snakes has decreased significantly.

However, most scientists cannot be considered this success in the rugged land of the island.