The Key Largo Wood Rat is endangered ONLY because of the 1,000 plus wild feral cats adopted by residents of the Ocean Reef Club. Also the residents cough up an amazing $100,000 a year to maintain the cats for food and vet. services. There has been NUMEROUS SCIENTIFIC PAPERS documenting this and calling for their removal. Also an endemic Cotton Mouse is also almost extirpated because of them yet NOTHING is said about the cats. On my website is a link to the cat problem. The best thing would be to allow the Pythons to remain and eat the cats. THE ABOVE IS NOT MY OPINION BUT IS WELL DOCUMENTED WITH A PLETHORA OF PAPERS MOST WRITTEN BY VARIOUS RESEARCHERS AT THE UNIVERSITY OF FLORIDA. USFWS nor any state agency wants to address this HUGE problem because the residents are very wealthy and politically powerful. Even past Presidents are sometimes in residence there. In the European version of the Burmese documentary by Nigel Marvin the cats are mentioned but NOT filmed even though I tried to pursue it. IT SEEMS NO ONE IS INTERESTED IN THE MOST DAMAGING INVASIVE OF ALL....Sorry for the rant.
-----
Tom Crutchfield

www.tomcrutchfield.com

[ Show Entire Thread ]