Every 50 years, the Melocanna baccifera bamboo flowers in the nothern Indian state of Mizoram, and when that occurs billions of bamboo seeds are produced which, in turn, boosts the Bamboo Rat population to astronomical levels.
What happens next, is a bit disturbing: the bamboo dies to the ground, and the rats then move outward, destroying crops like locusts on the land.
The last big rat pandemic in Mizoram (part of Assam) occured in 1959 (the year I was born), and mass famine resulted. Will that happen this time? Probably not, due to good roads to help bring in food and (just as important) many tons of rat poison.
Apparently there's a good article on all this in the current issuse of Vanity Fair magazine. A hat tip to the Old Man (hallowed be his name) who called that one in. We at www.terrierman.com, of course, are taking the story straight to video (see above).
For those interested in a few more articles on the continuing Global War on Rats see:
- The "war on rats" in Washington, D.C.
- The "war on rats" in New York City
- The "war on rats" in India & China
- The "war on rats" in Vietnam
Still want more? See the Rat Dog web site (now a subsidiary of Terrierman.com). Ratdog was the first version of the Terrierman.com site, and is now presented in a much reduced form. For the record, however, it is older than the Grateful Dead remnant band by the same name.
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