Plantations, silos, machines, barns and even indoor mice. This is a disturbing scenario faced by many farmers in southeastern Australia. In the past week, an infection of domestic mice has spread throughout the region, causing concern to the productive sector and public health.
In videos circulating on the Internet, the photos are also capable of providing coolness to people with “strong stomachs”. In one film, you can see hundreds of rodents coming out of a harvester. “It looks like a waterfall of mice”, commented an Internet user on a social network. In another, the floor of a container became practically unstable due to the number of rats.
According to the local government, the situation has worsened after a prolonged drought. With the restoration of the fields, the return of moisture to the soil and some natural predators, the mice began to breed rapidly.
According to the newspaper The Guardian, the plague has already estimated a loss of millions of dollars to producers, forcing the government to create a $ 50 million emergency aid package. In addition, the country’s Deputy Prime Minister, Michael McCormack, announced that responsible bodies would begin distributing chemical poisons completely free of charge to growers to counter invasions and preserve crop residues of certain crops.
With no signs of a crisis ending, some farmers are avoiding planting winter crops out of fear of damage to newly planted seeds and ripe grains.
In early May, the Australian Department of Pesticides and Veterinary Medicines Authority (APVMA) granted an emergency use license to allow farmers to cover portions of property sites with double strength zinc phosphate. Residents of the city were instructed to repair holes in their homes with steel wool, seal the doors and properly dispose of leftover food.
Mice also fire
Photo: News.com.au
Last Friday, 21, in the Australian city of New South Wales, a mother and three children were left homeless when mice destroyed the wires to their home, causing a fire in the area.
Rebekah Ward said, “Luckily, my children turned out to be spotless and they were standing in the front yard when I arrived at the scene.” According to local newspaper website News.com.auWhen they arrived at the scene to extinguish the fire, firefighters saw the rats thrown out of the window, desperate to escape the flames.
health risk
According to the Ministry of Health, mice have more than 35 diseases transmitted to humans and animals. The most common are leptospirosis, bubonic plague, typhus, salmonellosis, and hantavirus.
