MaxedOutMama
Wednesday, July 11, 2012
I Laughed So Hard
This really belongs on Small Dead Animals, but you have to read it here for now:
Not content with destroying their energy infrastructure, the Greens in Germany banned the primary agricultural rodent poison in 2008 due to environmental impacts.
The results have been alternately tragic and hilarious:
Farmers in Thuringia and Saxony-Anhalt are complaining that millions of field mice are devastating their food crops, including corn, barley and winter wheat. "They are eating everything," said Matthias Krieg, who manages an agricultural firm near the town of Zeitz in Saxony-Anhalt. "Not even the sugar beets are safe."...
Farmers already noticed an increase in the field mouse population in 2011 and began to take counter measures. According to Reinhard Kopp, a spokesman for the Thuringian Farmers' Association, agriculturalists set up hundreds of perches in their fields to lure birds of prey to kill the mice. But the operation was only moderately successful. "The birds got so fat from eating all the mice that they almost couldn't fly any more," Kopp said. "But they still couldn't keep up."
...
Instead, agriculturalists want drastic action. They have requested permission to deploy a rat poison called Ratron. Farmers in Germany have been banned from using the poison on large areas since 2008. Ironically, it was the indiscriminate use of Ratron by farmers in Saxony-Anhalt that led the agency to ban it in the first place, after the poison killed wild geese and endangered European hamsters.
The pensioners who can't afford to keep their lights on can now snicker at the farmers' suffering. A lot of those receiving the fat solar subsidies are farmers. Of course it won't be fun much longer as food prices rise!
I concede that I am not a nice person for laughing so hard, but what did everyone expect?
Two hard winters partly shielded the farmers from the results of the rodent poison ban, but this last winter was milder, so the inevitable happened. What they need is cats. Tens of thousands of them. But then the cats would eat the wild birds (think about the US campaign to ban outdoor cats).
Also the cats might end the mouse plague, and then the raptors would have to eat kittens. This would cause severe suffering in Germany, where laws protect household rodents from the cruelty of their human roommates.
If they do authorize the use of poison, then those fat raptors are going to be fat corpses, because they'll be eating poisoned rodents. Farmers have a lot of clout in Germany, so I presume they'll win this battle, but not before losing a good portion of this year's crop.
Comments:
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I'm tempted, like Jimmy, to chalk this up to the unintended consequences of policies planned and implemented by city folk. Ha-ha, what's the matter, born in a shopping district, were we?
But how many consequences must come and go before one must suspect that they're not exactly "unintended"? You'd think it wouldn't require an Einstein to predict that a lack of rodent poison will result in infestation.
But how many consequences must come and go before one must suspect that they're not exactly "unintended"? You'd think it wouldn't require an Einstein to predict that a lack of rodent poison will result in infestation.
If life gives you lemons, make lemonade!
When life gives you mice, make mice_____ ( fill in the blank. )
When life gives you mice, make mice_____ ( fill in the blank. )
# posted by 
: 10:24 AM
: 10:24 AM
It just HAS to be country environmentalists against city environmentalists, but the mind does boggle over it.
Or country mice versus city mice?
Neil, I don't think it is a stretch at all for urban-type environmentalists not to realize that a rodent plague will ensue. Yes, they are that clueless.
Or country mice versus city mice?
Neil, I don't think it is a stretch at all for urban-type environmentalists not to realize that a rodent plague will ensue. Yes, they are that clueless.
Scott - I'm glad it wasn't just me who thought of that. The anti-rat-poison faction will probably suggest that the farmers install sound systems and play classical music to drive the little buggers out. After all, if it works for teenagers. ...
Anon - Hey, I'm waiting for all the rockers to go over there for the Mouse-Aid concert.
Anon - Hey, I'm waiting for all the rockers to go over there for the Mouse-Aid concert.
Neil - not that I am criticizing your thinking. After all, it is a lot like removing the legs from a chair and then wondering why you can't reach the table because the seat is so low.
But much of modern fashionable environmentalism works exactly like that - these people are trained to think that way.
But much of modern fashionable environmentalism works exactly like that - these people are trained to think that way.
...these people are trained to think that way.
Exactly. They're just following fashionable thought. But the fashion is set by the cool kids, and I'm no longer certain that they're merely clueless.
Exactly. They're just following fashionable thought. But the fashion is set by the cool kids, and I'm no longer certain that they're merely clueless.
"I concede that I am not a nice person for laughing so hard, but what did everyone expect? "
The Germans call call it "schadenfruede"
The Germans call call it "schadenfruede"
# posted by : 1:18 PM
: 1:18 PM
Wait, there's a US movement to ban outdoor cats??
No wonder my neighborhood is overrun with rabbits and squirrels. Here I was thinking it was West Nile Virus doing in so many crows.
Ah, well, I expect the local bobcat population to rise in a few years if the smaller cats are in lockup.
No wonder my neighborhood is overrun with rabbits and squirrels. Here I was thinking it was West Nile Virus doing in so many crows.
Ah, well, I expect the local bobcat population to rise in a few years if the smaller cats are in lockup.
# posted by : 7:13 AM
: 7:13 AM
BTW, I think I am going to change my handle to Russell Waseinfrod (was eine [a] fraud). Couldn't think of a clever play with "John Corzine".
# posted by : 7:24 AM
: 7:24 AM
Charles - you don't mean to imply that in our ecosystem's natural state birds and small animals had predators, do you?
Such heresy will not be tolerated! Don't you know that this was the Garden of Eden before we humans ruined it?
PS: All the bobcats are vegans.
Such heresy will not be tolerated! Don't you know that this was the Garden of Eden before we humans ruined it?
PS: All the bobcats are vegans.
When the contradictions and stupidity of the do gooders on the left blow up in their faces ... that is the best entertainment on the planet.
# posted by : 11:33 AM
: 11:33 AM
I'd say it's not exactly them following "fashionable" thought as an absolute, total, 100% refusal to ever, ever, ever think past first-level effects. If they had simply asked, what will happen if we stop killing field mice, they would have figured it out, but this mentality - first-level effects only - is exactly what our government and most people do, day in, day out.
It's not fashion; it's laziness.
It's not fashion; it's laziness.
# posted by : 1:51 PM
: 1:51 PM
"There was an old lady who swallowed a fly. I dunno why she swallowed that fly, Perhaps she'll die. "
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# posted by : 6:02 PM
: 6:02 PM << Home
