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The Times of India
The Times of India
World
TOI World Desk

In 2024, Marshall Islands crews cleared rats from two remote islands: A year later, 2,000 sooty terns returned

Conservation teams spread rat bait across Bikar Atoll and Jemo Islet in the Marshall Islands using drones in July 2024. A year later, monitoring teams found a new colony of about 2,000 sooty terns on Bikar and thousands of native tree seedlings across the forest floor. Invasive rats had overrun the two remote islands for years. The rodents ate native vegetation, seabird eggs and young, turtle hatchlings and other wildlife. On Jemo, they also damaged resources traditionally collected by people from the nearby Likiep Atoll. The Marshall Islands government led the restoration effort, with technical support from Island Conservation. By 2025, monitoring indicated that the rats had been successfully removed from both islands.

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