Wildlife experts fear that a rat could disrupt the island’s delicate balance, so they are pulling out all the stops.
The last time a rat found its way to Alaska’s St. Paul Island, in 2018, residents took nearly a year to find and kill it. Officials fear another rat has arrived, and they have enlisted residents and the federal government on a fevered hunt to catch it.
St. Paul Island is a tiny land mass in the Bering Sea that boasts a stunning array of wildlife, including rare sea birds and fur seals. Wildlife experts say a rat infestation could easily upset the delicate balance that allows the island’s wildlife to thrive.
The potential disruption is why it went on alert in June, when the Ecosystem Conservation Office, an agency in the Aleut Community of St. Paul Island Tribal Government, received a call from a resident who claimed to have spotted a rat.
The office’s director, Lauren Divine, investigated. “I immediately started asking questions and started crawling under the porch,” she said in a call on Tuesday.
Her team looked for signs of a rat, like droppings and chew marks, and aimed flashlights at dark corners. It deployed traps loaded with peanut butter and field cameras. It also called in what Dr. Divine described as a “rat strike team,” which includes various federal agencies who assist in case an invasive species makes it to the island.
The island’s roughly 400 residents were told to look for signs of a rat. An infestation would be catastrophic for St. Paul, which has been called the Galápagos of the North.