Rat peril for life on Reef

BLACK rats are wiping out bird colonies, fish life and even fragile coral reefs off tropical islands, new research shows.

Coral experts, in a paper in the journal Nature Today, are urging authorities to kill the rats to save the reef.

Predators such as rats – which feed on bird eggs, chicks and even adult birds – are estimated to have reduced seabird populations in 90 per cent of the world’s temperate and tropical island groups.

The study found rat-infested islands also had 50 per cent less fish and lower coral growth.

Townsville-based co-author Dr Andrew Hoey, of James Cook University, said the impact of rats had been unknown until now.

“Conservation can sometimes be a bloody business,” report co-author Assoc Prof Aaron MacNeil, of Dalhousie University in Canada, said.

“Doing right by the ecosystem means there is a time to kill. For these invasive rats, that time is now.”