Last week’s Concord Bridge published an article, “What a Hoot,” about a barred owl which was exhibiting unusual behavior in that it was sitting on the fence by the Bruce Freeman Rail Trail, in broad daylight, allowing people to approach it within about five or six feet.
Perhaps not coincidentally, I had been shocked to see a rodent poison trap located beside one of the commercial buildings on Baker Avenue Extension. These traps dispense rodenticides that kill rats and mice with a powerful anticoagulant. But they do not kill immediately, and so the weakened rodents become easy prey for raptors and other predators who then suffer and die slow and painful deaths. One example is the iconic bald eagle in Arlington that was named MK.
Poisoned rodents can also easily be caught or be scavenged by pets who then develop the horrific symptoms of internal hemorrhaging. If caught early enough, some of these animals can be treated with vitamin K to reverse the anticoagulant action, but many have died.
Such anticoagulant pesticides are banned for private use in Massachusetts, but may still be used by professional pest control companies. Several local communities, including Lexington and Arlington, have initiated bans on the use of such traps on town land but towns cannot override state law to more fully ban them.
The degree of concern about these poisons has let state Rep. Michelle Ciccolo to propose legislation to stop the use of rodenticide and the use of rodent traps that use anticoagulants. We need to enact this kind of legislation to prevent so many tragic deaths.
Janet Miller
Main Street
