Removing rats helps revive forests, birds & coral in the Marshall Islands

On Bikar Atoll and Jemo Islet of the Marshall Islands, seabirds are returning, forests are regrowing and coral reefs are recovering. And it all stems from the removal of a single invasive pest: rats. Rats were once so abundant on Bikar and Jemo that they “utterly dominated the lower levels of the forest,” Paul Jacques, project manager with the nonprofit Island Conservation (IC), told Mongabay by email. “It was impossible to walk more than twenty metres [65 feet] without seeing a rat,” he added. As omnivores, rats feasted on all that the islands had to offer, including coconut crabs, a key food for local communities, as well as the seeds and seedlings of native trees like Pisonia grandis, halting forest regeneration. They also ate the eggs and young of turtles and seabirds, devastating thei