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Latter_Fortune_7225 t1_iub5pkw wrote

Good. Rat poisons are terrible for wildlife.

Might be worth developing a natural solution like Australia has done, creating 1080 poison from the native Heart leaf poison bush (gastrolobium grandiflorum) to target introduced foxes and cats, and not harm native wildlife in the process.

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Onemilliondown t1_iuc9rh5 wrote

Sodium fluoroacetate, (1080) has quite serious secondary poisoning issues. In some circumstances the secondary effects can be lower than the damage caused by the target species. But it is far from perfect.

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WickedSlice_ t1_iucc1du wrote

Yeah native wildlife in Australia are so protected from 1080 that they use it in NZ to kill Possums which were introduced from Australia..

Don’t believe the BS that it doesn’t kill native Aussie animals.

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Latter_Fortune_7225 t1_iucetbf wrote

That would be because it isn't designed to keep native Australian species safe if it's being used in New Zealand.

Ours are designed to protect our species:

> The incredibly tiny amount of 1080 injected into each wild dog and fox bait is deadly to those species but safe for native predators, including birds of prey (e.g. wedge-tailed eagles), reptiles (e.g. goannas) and the iconic spotted-tailed quoll. Despite incorrect claims that 1080 is harmful to these native species, in reality they are all known to eat meat baits poisoned with the compound 1080 and survive. 

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shwiftyname t1_iudcm40 wrote

A sign stating “FERAL CAT SAUSAGE” I spotted while vacationing on the Island of Maui sent me searching the internet until I discovered that sausages were FOR controlling feral cats, and were not FROM or OF feral cats. The sausages, an Australian invention, can be safely consumed by native wildlife but are toxic to feral felines.

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catinterpreter t1_iud1l9o wrote

The Australian poison is cruel in its own right.

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Latter_Fortune_7225 t1_iueykq2 wrote

How so? How else can we control such a devastatingly destructive, introduced species without harming our native wildlife?

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mynameisneddy t1_iuejqmt wrote

1080 is a terrible poison, it kills indiscriminately, is an exceptionally painful death and unlike anticoagulants there’s no antidote for accidental poisoning.

The only reason it’s widely used in NZ is there’s no realistic alternative against possum invasion to protect our millions of hectares of native forest other than dropping it from helicopters. It’s quite contentious though, and if there’s was a realistic alternative we’d use it.

And in populated areas anticoagulants are used, because 1080 is too dangerous.

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