Posted on 07/14/2007 3:14:18 AM PDT by TigerLikesRooster
Mass murder of mice not enough
Created: 2007-7-14 0:00:01
Author:Alice Gu
ABOUT one million mice, up to 40 tons, have been poisoned to death in the past 20 days in the Dongting Lake area of central China's Hunan Province. However, authorities said the dead mice were not buried and their remains could be seen almost everywhere.
Villagers from the 20 counties in the lake area have used everything from clubs and shovels to kill mice scurrying towards homes while others used fishing nets to stop the rats.
However, people later realized mice poison might be the oldest but most efficient weapon to repel the rodents.
"We spent 18,000 yuan (US$2,378) to buy 6,000 kilograms of rice and 320 grams of poison," Xu Hongbing, Party head of badly-stricken Binhu Village, told the Oriental Morning Post.
"We mixed the rice with the poison and began to scatter it on cropland on June 23, the third day of the invasion," Xu added.
Mice corpses could be found everywhere and some villagers even threw them into the Dongting Lake. Authorities have warned of the poison creating unintended damage due to improper handling of dead mice.
The Binhu Village office has received reports of at least 1,100 cats and dogs dying after eating the poison or poisoned mice.
Meanwhile villagers are risking their own health by disobeying orders to wear gloves and rain boots to avoid direct contact with mice, Xu warned. "Villagers are only concerned about killing the mice and aren't thinking about their own safety," he said.
An expert with the Ministry of Agriculture told China Central Television that the battle has only just begun as "only 15 percent of total mice in the lake area have been killed."
With the lake's water level rising, more mice will be forced from their burrows on islands and onto cropland, which can threaten human health, Guo Yongwang said in the report.
A short rainy season and a small dam built at the upper stream of the Dongting made the area a hotbed for the rodents.
"They have more space to dig holes and there is an abundant food supply on wetlands," Xu said.
The invasion is the biggest since 1982, when the provincial government began keeping records.
Mice were forced to the croplands of the 20 counties in the lake area when the Yangtze River flooded on June 21, raising the water level in the Dongting and submerging mouse holes on islands in the lake.
The Dongting Lake area has been hit by 10 mice invasions since 1982.
Besides electronics, you can purchase made in USA products on the web. It takes time to search but is possible. One can find just about anything that is still made here. I’ve been doing it for a few years now. Imagine if all FReepers did this.
I thought they would just eat them.
I’d eat a mouse long before I ever ate a cat. Or dog.
Here are some websites for made in USA:
http://www.madeinusa.org
http://www.usstuff.com
http://www.buyamericanmart.com
I just searched them; there are others. And then there’s ebay. If you want a product no longer being made in America, it’s probably on ebay! I have a fondness for old tools, they rarely break; ebay has some real treasures in that category.
>Imagine if all FReepers did this.<
You would be called prejudical and a racist. I’m kinda proud to be called those names these days. Vigilante is still my favorite though.
Disgusting........
Mice or rats? Is this the same problem as before?
What I’m wondering is why the Chinese aren’t eating them. They’re supposed to be very high quality protein and have to be better quality that most of the other stuff over there they call food.
excuse me.......urp......
Peta think.
Eww. Probably chopped up mice, rats, and maybe even real dogs. I find it so disgusting that the Chinese eat dogs.
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