
Two thousand mice dropped on Guam by parachute to kill snakes - BrandonMarc
http://usnews.nbcnews.com/_news/2013/12/02/21724382-two-thousand-mice-dropped-on-guam-by-parachute-to-kill-snakes?lite
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DanBC
> 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
I'm curious, how do people accidentally overdose 15 tablets ?

~~~
hdevalence
From the bottle of acetaminophen on my desk:

Take 1 or 2 tablets with water, every 4 to 6 hours. If pain or fever does not
respond to 1 tablet, take 2 tablets at the next dose."

Now, why wait to take 2 tablets? And maybe your headache is really bad. If 2
are stronger, 4 must be better.... 4 pills every four hours means that in a
day you can get 8 grams dosage. Sure, it says "No more than 8", but it's in
tiny letters, and most people don't actually realise just how serious the
danger is.

16 tablets over the course of the day isn't really what most people think of
as a drug overdose for something as "innocent" as tylenol. In addition, some
cold medicine has acetaminophen in it, and you might not realize that your
cough syrup was contributing to your dosage. Then bam, liver failure.

If you're genuinely curious, there's a really good episode of This American
Life on acetaminophen poisoning and the labeling standards set by the FDA.

Link: [http://www.thisamericanlife.org/radio-
archives/episode/505/u...](http://www.thisamericanlife.org/radio-
archives/episode/505/use-only-as-directed)

~~~
bentcorner
The example in TAL's podcast that really got me was the mixup between infant
and child tylenol that resulted in the death of a child.

I've gotten in the habit (before I had children) of reading labels and
understanding their contents, dosages and concentrations (if only for the
amusement that there seems to be only a handful of drugs in boxes that
typically take up several meters of store shelf space). However, the situation
of the death of that child in the podcast wasn't out of the ordinary. Simple
miscommunication between parent and doctor, and the lack of knowledge of how
little acetaminophen you really need to overdose.

Specifying dosages as volumes of liquid is dangerous without knowledge of
concentration. Better to specify mg of acetaminophen and let people work the
math out (maybe that's asking too much).

~~~
malandrew
I honestly don't understand why printing the LD50 isn't mandatory on all
warning labels.

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lkozma
I 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?

~~~
gamegoblin
I just recently emailed someone telling them they'd been hellbanned when they
had done nothing apparent that deserved it, and continued to post for months.

Hellbanning is definitely something I really dislike about this website. I
can't imagine submitting and commenting for months only to find out I was
wasting my time.

~~~
yeukhon
Hellban is the most ignorant and stupidest invention, yet the most effective
way to take down oppositions.

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Volscio
In 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-
bein...](http://www.kuam.com/story/24108238/2013/12/02/dead-mice-being-
dropped-from-the-sky-to-combat-snakes)

------
dgavey
I'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.

~~~
ams6110
And, 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
Gene pool is probably very small - if they were introduced with a couple from
a cargo ship, maybe microscopic. Little chance for selection to work.

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thearn4
Very 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.

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dangerboysteve
why do I think the news heading next year will be "2000 snakes dropped on Guam
by parachute to kill mouse over population"

~~~
ABS
the mice were dead

~~~
dangerboysteve
yes, I know it was a joke. Kill of the snakes and the natural mouse and rat
population would increase.

~~~
ABS
right, 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!

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efnx
I 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
_Also - what of the other scavenging animals?_

Many of them will finally find headache relief.

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nomercy400
And they didn't film it?!? I was really looking forward to see 2000 mice on
mini parachutes being dropped out of a helicopter.

~~~
BrandonMarc
2000 _dead_ paratrooper-mice, mind you. Zombie mice?

~~~
ChuckMcM
World War mZ perhaps :-)

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mathrawka
I'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.

~~~
ams6110
The story says the snakes "snack" on the birds but I'm guessing it's actually
the eggs that they are snacking on?

~~~
mathrawka
Yes, that is correct.

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niels_olson
Ok, 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).

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bridger
Am I the only one that wants pictures of these mice flying down in their
cardboard and tissue paper parachutes?

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wnevets
At first I thought the title meant the mice were going to eat the snakes

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shubhamjain
Off topic, but I think two or three articles from front page arrived in my
"The Daily Digg" newsletter. The newsletter serves very intresting content.

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calvinlough
2000 mice but 2 million snakes? Am I missing something? Is this just a trial
run?

~~~
ZoF
>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.

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spokenn
Surprised to see Guam on HN... I'm from Saipan!

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girvo
That's a pretty cool hack. Low tech is best sometimes!

