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Two thousand mice dropped on Guam by parachute to kill snakes
- niels_olson 13y agoOk, anyone else's school have a tradition of catching mice in their dorm and "help them earn their jump wings" by making a napkin parachute and tossing them out a window? If not, this sounds like some Academy grads have been having a little to much fun (the Navy and to a lesser extent, Air Force have a heavy presence on Guam).
- shubhamjain 13y agoOff topic, but I think two or three articles from front page arrived in my "The Daily Digg" newsletter. The newsletter serves very intresting content.
- girvo 13y agoThat's a pretty cool hack. Low tech is best sometimes!
- DanBC 13y ago> For some reason, the snakes are almost uniquely sensitive to acetaminophen, the active ingredient in the ubiquitous over-the-counter painkiller. If you can get a tree snake to eat just 80 milligrams, you can kill it. That's only about one-sixth of a standard pill — pigs, dogs and other similarly sized animals would have to eat about 500 of them to get into any trouble. Just a quick note: Paracetamol is a great and useful painkiller. It's safe if taken properly. But it is dangerous when taken in overdose. People who've taken an overdose of paracetamol must get medical attention as soon as possible, even if they feel well. A standard UK tablet is 500 mg. 15 tablets - 7.5 g, is enough to be lethal. People accidentally overdose and die from paracetamol. You don't do that with "500 of them to get in any trouble".
- option_greek 13y agoI'm curious, how do people accidentally overdose 15 tablets ?
- mortov 13y agoBy not reading the label when they take multiple cold and flu remedies all containing paracetamol to speed up their recovery. Or reading articles which say you need 500 for there to be any risk.
- ars 13y agoOr by misreading articles. Which is also how people overdose - by misreading bottles. The article says 500 bait doses, not 500 pills.
- DanBC 13y agoBottles are usually a lot clearer than this article paragraph. > For some reason, the snakes are almost uniquely sensitive to acetaminophen, the active ingredient in the ubiquitous over-the-counter painkiller. If you can get a tree snake to eat just 80 milligrams, you can kill it. That's only about one-sixth of a standard pill — pigs, dogs and other similarly sized animals would have to eat about 500 of them to get into any trouble. Most people are going to read that as 500 pills, not 500 doses of one sixth of a standard pill.
- vilhelm_s 13y ago500/6 pills is also way more than the lethal dose in a dog or human. And I wonder what exactly a "similar sized animal" is, since a pig is ten times bigger than a dog (20kg and 200kg according to Wolfram Alpha).
- deeringc 13y agoI guess maybe by mixing different medications that each individually contain high levels of paracetamol? A lot of different over-the-counter medications contain it and if you took 3 separate meds you could quickly end up in that situation.
- mortov 13y agoIndeed, paracetamol (as most of the world calls it) is highly toxic to many species - while people have a small tolerance to it, there are many documented cases of people suffering fatal liver damage through doses only just above the maximum daily dose of, typically, 4g. Domestic cats can die from simply licking tablets due to their extreme sensitivity - which sounds more sensitive than snakes, making them not 'unique' either. I'm extremely sceptical of a claim of '500' published in that context - to the point of thinking that sounds positively reckless and liable to make people take extremely dangerous doses in the belief that huge numbers are needed to present any risk. In the UK, packages can only be purchased in maximum quantities of 16 tablets and maximum 2 boxes per purchase to reduce the risk of both accidental and deliberate overdosage (with a significant decrease in overdose incidents as a result).
- scott_s 13y agoThis American Life recently did an episode on how even a few tablets over the recommended dose can cause serious harm in some people: http://www.thisamericanlife.org/radio-archives/episode/505/use-only-as-directed http://www.thisamericanlife.org/radio-archives/episode/505/u...
- dmacedo 13y agoPeople reading/commenting seem to be misreading the 500 number. Note it's comparing to the previous number 80mg, it's not '500 pills' or '500 tablets' it is 500mg. Which is consistent with the remaining text and known literature.
- chime 13y agoIt says 500 of them. I've never heard a unit of measure like "mg" being referred to it as "them". So it makes sense to interpret that as "pills".
- lsaferite 13y agoThem, in this case, refers to the dosed mice and the fact that an animal would have to consume 500 of the mice to run into any toxicity issues. (At least that is my reading of the poorly worded sentence)
- ars 13y agoThem refers to bait doses. They are not dropping pills out of the helicopter, they are dropping bait and people are worried about other creatures eating the bait.
- scott_s 13y agoWhich is fair, but seeing as how many people were confused (I was), it's probably not a good wording.
- vilhelm_s 13y agoBut it doesn't? If the bait dose is 80mg, then 500 doses would be 40,000mg. I think they must mean 500mg -- that's consistent with the toxic dose being 200mg/kg in dogs and 10mg/kg in cats [1]. The phrasing is super bad, I wonder if it was altered by a copy-editor who added a unit but misunderstood the intended meaning. [1] http://www.ebvet.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=9&t=383 http://www.ebvet.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=9&t=383
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- nickff 13y agoAnother significant danger is posed to anyone who has been drinking in the days before taking the drug. The enzymes which process alcohol also process the paracetamol, and will be present in elevated levels, potentially causing liver damage. What is important is that the danger is caused by taking paracetamol some time (hours or days) after having consumed alcohol; most people think that paracetamol is only dangerous when taken with alcohol.
- Osmium 13y agoAny source on the specific length of time after drinking one should avoid paracetamol?
- nickff 13y agoI have never been able to find good data on this, but from what I have gathered, the effect depends on how much you have been drinking (drinks/day), and how long you have been doing it (# of days). It does seem that gathering valid data on this would be very useful, but I am not sure how one could do a randomized control trial, when the express goal of doing so would be to measure the harm done by the 'treatment'.
- InclinedPlane 13y agoThere are two big problems with acetaminophen as a medicication. One, the theraputic dose is far too close to the lethal or hazardous dosages. Two, because it's been in use for so long there ends up being a lot of it in many medications, though some people don't appreciate that. For example, let's say you are feeling under the weather with typical flu symptoms including body ache and congestion. So you decide to take some nyquil. But you're feeling so achy that you decide to take some acetaminophen as well. And you drink a glass of water with some alka-seltzer to settle your stomache before bed. Not such crazy things to do. And maybe you inadvisably decide to take larger doses than you should, because you feel really crummy and you want to feel better (and more drugs = stronger effects, right?) So you take a triple dose of nyquil and a double dose of acetaminophen. Except now you've 4,000 to 5,000 mg of acetaminophen. Then tack on the extra half gram from a double dose of alka-seltzer plus severe cold & flu (which maybe you forgot was the only variety you had in the cabinet) and you are well into dangerous territory. Combine that with re-upping doses at less than the recommended interval and things can get scary very fast.
- cperciva 13y agoI wrote to the author and this has now been reworded: "pigs, dogs and other similarly sized animals would have to eat about 500 of the baited mice to get a lethal dose".
- DanBC 13y agoThank you. It's really nice to hear that they listened and did something. And I'm grateful to you for actually doing something!
- cperciva 13y agoI find that reporters tend to be very good for changes after an article is published -- much easier to fix mistakes at that point than before publication, in fact, since they no longer have an editor breathing down their neck.
- malandrew 13y agoAt over 4000mg in humans in a 24 hour period and you overload the first two metabolic pathways in the liver for Acetaminophen, forcing it to go through another pathway where a toxic by-product is made by the body. Ingestion of alcohol can drop this approximate 4000mg before toxicity is experienced down to about 2000mg. I know this because I've been skating awfully close to that 4000mg ceiling for about one week now. I had my tonsils removed last Wednesday and need at least 20mg of oxycodone per 4-6 hour people to handle the pain. Unfortunately every 10mg of oxycodone is bundled with 325mg of acetaminaphen. I really hope lobbying by Tylenol is eventually reversed and oxycodone and other opiates can be pressed into pills without acetaminaphen. It's ridiculous that I and others get close to poisoning our livers because of unnecessary bundling of drugs. (FWIW I weight ~240 lbs)
- specialist 13y agoVirtual hug. I had my tonsils removed as an adult too. Not fun. I've been thru a lot. I thought "Ha, cake walk, no prob." Wrong.
- malandrew 13y agoThanks. It's pretty brutal. I've lost 25 lbs in 7 days already from it.
- thearn4 13y agoVery curious to know if they set up a ODE 101-style Lotka–Volterra (predator-prey) system beforehand to gauge the impact. If so, that would make a pretty interesting "real-word" teaching example.
- nomercy400 13y agoAnd they didn't film it?!? I was really looking forward to see 2000 mice on mini parachutes being dropped out of a helicopter.
- BrandonMarc 13y ago2000 dead paratrooper-mice, mind you. Zombie mice?
- ChuckMcM 13y agoWorld War mZ perhaps :-)
- maxerickson 13y agoThey are chucking them out one at a time. Somebody linked the Guam TV report and it is also linked through in the NBC article, it shows them doing it.
- dgavey 13y agoI'm not sure they thought this through completely. As a person who owns a snake, I can tell you that convincing a snake to eat an already dead mouse, when they are not used to it, is not easy. They prefer live and warm prey. I'd be very surprised if this actually works with any amount of efficiency. Perhaps the brown tree snake is different than typical captive snakes, but in my opinion it would be only be more difficult to convince a wild snake to eat an already dead mouse.
- BrandonMarc 13y agoGood question. I wonder if a captive snake is accustomed to knowing it'll be fed with some regularity, whereas a wild one is less certain if / when it'll find its next meal.
- dgavey 13y agoThey definitely get accustomed, she is quite predictable in her time table and eating habits. It took a good couple months before she finally ate her first mouse. The brown tree snake in Guam appears to be quite the survivor and doesn't appear to be as picky. Still, from the little I do understand about snakes, the temperature of the food seems to play a major factor for them. That's where I'm most concerned about this plan failing.
- maxerickson 13y agoThe article says there are 2 million snakes and that they dropped 2000 mice. Sounds like a test to me.
- ams6110 13y agoAnd, even if they do eat them, if there's any significant variation in natural tolerance to acetaminophen among the snakes, you will just end up selecting for it and eventually this approach will stop working. Still, if it works, it's cheap and relatively harmless control for the short term.
- JoeAltmaier 13y ago
- Volscio 13y agoIn case you are as surprised as I was that they would bury the lede and not show the "parachute" or how they drop these in, here's a news story with a video: http://www.kuam.com/story/24108238/2013/12/02/dead-mice-being-dropped-from-the-sky-to-combat-snakes http://www.kuam.com/story/24108238/2013/12/02/dead-mice-bein...
- deleted 13y ago[deleted]
- wnevets 13y agoAt first I thought the title meant the mice were going to eat the snakes
- dangerboysteve 13y agowhy do I think the news heading next year will be "2000 snakes dropped on Guam by parachute to kill mouse over population"
- ABS 13y agothe mice were dead
- dangerboysteve 13y agoyes, I know it was a joke. Kill of the snakes and the natural mouse and rat population would increase.
- ABS 13y agoright, I thought you hand't RTFA :-) 2000 mice for 2 million snakes is unlikely to make any meaningful difference but will test if the approach can be used as a way to control the snake population... I guess!
- lkozma 13y agoI would just like to point out to dba7dba that his account seems to be banned and the post appears as [dead], just like all the other posts he wrote in the past 294 days (but not those before). Reading his contribution in this thread and some of his earlier comments, it is not at all obvious why he is banned - moderating a forum is fine, but letting someone post for another year without telling them they are banned seems outright cruel - what is going on here exactly?
- ScottWhigham 13y agoI saw one post of his in this thread. It was [dead] and I assumed it was because it was completely off-topic and self-serving. There was no tie-in to this article except the idea of a 'snake on an island'. I didn't flag it but I can see how some people might do so. Is that why? No clue! Just offering what I saw.
- swombat 13y agoI think his post in this thread is fairly informative. I didn't realise snakes could cause that much damage to a holiday paradise by eating the birds that eat the spiders.
- ScottWhigham 13y agoIt's off topic though, isn't it? It's not in any way about the article. It's tangential, I suppose. That's why I think several people hit the 'flag' link. Just for clarity - I didn't flag it. It was already [dead] when I saw it. I'm just guessing.
- stephth 13y agoIt's not in any way about the article. Are the effects of snakes in Guam not close enough for you? :) Anyway being tangential or meta doesn't seem to be an unpopular thing in HN. Also, you can't flag comments. (Edit: Yes you can.)
- calvinlough 13y ago2000 mice but 2 million snakes? Am I missing something? Is this just a trial run?
- ZoF 13y ago>The unlikely invasion was the fourth and biggest rodent air assault so far Throughout the article there's multiple statements that imply that this wasn't intended to be a one-time complete eradication.
- mathrawka 13y agoI've been to Guam a few times, most recently this summer. I spent some time visiting the historical places as well as hiking and snorkeling. It always is a bit sobering to realize how war-ridden the history of the island is and the effects of it. And then add in the brown tree snake problem... Just hiking without hearing a single bird is a new experience.
- efnx 13y agoI just like thinking about how the snakes that survive will be a member of at least one of two groups: * those that don't eat mice. * those that are better at processing acetaminophen. Also - what of the other scavenging animals?
- MrZongle2 13y agoAlso - what of the other scavenging animals? Many of them will finally find headache relief.
- songgao 13y agoAgreed. I think it's kind of like anti-biotics. If the dose is not heavy and frequent enough to kill all of them, this would serve as a natural selector that filters out those snakes who like mice and are weak at acetaminophen, but let the others survive. The result of this is reducing number of rivals of those survivors, thus giving them better opportunity to live. After several iterations, those who remain there are the ones that you can't use this method to kill.
- spokenn 13y agoSurprised to see Guam on HN... I'm from Saipan!
- bridger 13y agoAm I the only one that wants pictures of these mice flying down in their cardboard and tissue paper parachutes?