midwest muskrats.

[MartyPhipps]

The coyote/red fox debate got me thinking what has happened to all of our muskrats? Some claim raptors.

I think it's water quality and channelling ditches.
Used to be anybody could round up 100 rats walking creeks. My uncle and his son did it in one night.

I also remember the creeks being choked with lily pads, and watercress.
Maybe it's a change in herbicide, but these days, I wouldn't know where to look in Illinois to find lily pads, or watercress.

[trappnman]

Marty- I believe its a combination of many things.

in no particular order:

1) raptors

3) a series of constant floods or drought

4) vegetation changes in habitat due to herbicides changing the type of habitat.

I had a good conversation with John Erb, MN's very qualified wildlife biologist- and his thought was #3 was the main cause on the marshes. He said the marshes look all green and healthy- but other grasses are replacing the grasses rats thrive on.

But he also thinks 1 and 2 are contributing factors.

[dj88ryr]

A lot of our streams or choked with watercress, but some have rats most don't.

[trappnman]

oddly- some of my better streams are good watercress streams. Not choked, but plenty of it.

[kyboy]

Man I know Ky's rat population has suffered badly. I remember up to about 15 years ago I could walk the creek bordering corn bottoms and catch7- 10 rats out of 15 sets for a few nights in a row befor it slacked off much. Now you may catch 2 out of 15 sets for a couple of nights befor it slacks off or peters out all together There just not there anymore.

[MartyPhipps]

We don't have marshes anymore. They all run through pipe.

Maybe raptors, and flood/drought where you are at, but I don't buy it for here. It's been 20 years since we had an abundance of rats. We're talking about an animal that can have 3 to 4 litters per year.
Dredging and herbicides.

Interesting to think about the changes here since when I was a kid.

No yotes, buzzards, or much for deer. Now we have lots.
No turkeys then, more game fish now (less hog farms).
Less rats, reds, and mink.
Oh, and not as many beavers back then.

Older folks than me say there was a time when there were almost no coon... before my time.

[FWS]

This has been and is being studied and changing land use patterns is a big factor as has been pointed out.

[bobwendt]

farm pesticides and herbicides running off into our drainages, in particular atrazine and atrazine derivatives. they cause male sterility and 100% of the ground water in the row crop states exceeds the limits . go to prairie states and non row crop country and rats are thick as ever. go to the non stop for hundreds of miles of corn/bean ground and de-zippo on the rats. rat ditches that ran 100 rats/1/4 mile prior to modern chemical use and no till (`70`s and before)are now MAYBE 1 old adult male left. will it ever be admitted to or corrected by gov`t? nope, because farming is a multi billion dollar biz and rats are chump change. only rub is human fertility is dropping at 1%/ every other year or so worldwide. look at the upside, your grandchioldren, if you can get any, won`t have to worry about competition to catch the last rat. no one else will be alive to compete for it. and the deal about the coyotes killing all the groundhogs? uh uh, same thing. still plenty of hogs left in non intensive row crop ground. unirtunatly atrazine affect rodents with fast life cycles the most and doesn`t make male coon or beaver sterile. got to take the bitter with the sweet. I`m going to quit buying rat poison for the barn and just scatter atrazine granules around, a lot cheaper. simazine is the best I imagine as it easily water soluble. I`ll go dump a bag in every drainage of everyone that tells me they live in intensive farm country and they have rats thick, to puinish them for lieing, or being so young they think 30 rats a season is lots of them.

[MartyPhipps]

Bob, you touched on an excellent point.
If ground water is affecting rats, what's it doing to us?

Interesting you brought up groundhogs.
When I was a kid, there were almost none. About 10 or 12 years ago they were everywhere. Good money in ADC.
Now they're almost gone again.

[thorsmightyhammer]

Although there is an increase in raptors I mostly dismiss them as a large source of muskrat decline. Maybe in isolated areas. But...if the rats were around all over like in past would they be a problem.

No doubt in my mind that modern farming practices are wholly to blame. There is an area just north of me that 50 years ago several thousand rats a year used to be harvested. Now its devoid of water.

Very, very little atrazine used up here Bob as there isnt much corn. Round-up is used quite extensively. No doubt that all chemicles and excess nitrogen are haveing an impact as well.

[bobwendt]

in downtown indianapolis rats abound in retention ponds for housing complexes. poor skinny little sobs living off yard grass only. also groundhogs abound in backyards, under houses etc. one common denominator, no farm chemicals in urban areas. raptors I dismiss also as wyoming has more eagles and hawks and owls than you can shake a stick at, yet plenty skinny rats in marginal sorry habitat, but again, chemical free. like the coyote is to the red fox, the farmer is to the rat. also I dismiss floods and droughts as wev`e always had them and always had rats , untill late 70`s. I remember every ditch in the country going plumb dry and the rats heading to the bigger water and then with fall rains re-stocking the creeks and ditches. also remember terrible floods thru may and june when first rat litters were coming and thinking surely all the babys drown, but that fall, bumper rat crops. they are so prolific they can take about any abuse you can give them, except removing that prolific breeding ability.

[Ridgerunner]

Here is a rundown for North Central WV as compared to 20-25 years ago:

Keep in mind, these are mostly my own observations coupled with a small compilation of factual data. (*)

Muskrat: Far Fewer.
Mink: Somewhat Fewer.
*Beaver: Far More.
*Otter: From basically none to some; which I believe to have been introduced. No trapping.
*Fisher: (25) introduced in 1968 or 1969. Population and territories growing. Trapping: Limit of one per season.
Coon: Somewhat cyclic, but in general, quite a few more.
Red Fox: Noticeably Fewer in this specific area.
Gray Fox: Seems about the same.
*Coyote: Began showing up in the late seventies. Many many coyotes now, and seemingly expanding.
*Bobcats: Quite a few more in recent years.
Possums and Skunks: Seemingly about the same with skunks falling during certain years due to rabies.

Turkeys: Trap and transplant program,(mountain areas to lowlands) from late sixties to late eighties. Way more turkeys! Huge late winter flocks are observed.

Raptors: Hawks: Far More ... Buzzards (turkey vultures) : Far More ... Barred Owls: Somewhat More.

Here is an oddity: Timber Rattlers showing up in some areas (especially mountains) where, to the best of my knowledge, there were none.

[cowman]

I don't buy the atrazine deal, we used 100x more atrazine in the 60's and 70's than today, but my biologist said the surfactant (a soapy additive to make it stick to the leaf) in roundup herbicide is the culprit. Everyone here uses roundup but very little atrazine.
My 'rat numbers here are the worst ever, way lower than last year and we had plenty of water this year too. I have caught 24 rats so far and 90% are little kits. But our coon numbers are thru the roof, and no distemper yet like last year.

[bobwendt]

might be round up. I wouldn`t argue which chemical, just that it is farm herbicides. interestingly there are quite a few nebulous tree diseases with names like "ash decline" ,where growth essentially stops and the trees hang on for 20 years but always sickly. I feel vaporization of farm chemicals, flooding into bottomland woods and negligent intentional spraying under windy conditions next to woodlots are the cause of much of that also. the farmer is the golden calf and is poisoning our whole planet. I`m not a liberal greeny but sooner or later the piper will have to be paid and the price will be terrible high by then. rats will be the least of the issues. only when our childrens children are sterile and the human race unable to reproduce will the chemical issues be taken seriously by our gov`t. money talks and EVERYTHING else walks. always has, always will. witness the nta for example and what caused it`s downfall.

[Ridgerunner]

Sorry guys, I don't know what made me feel like I should offer a rundown on all those critters ... ... Oh well, may be of some interest to someone.

Here is an observation with the 'rats: For the 5 or so years I have seen virtually none, nada, zip, "push-ups" in the cattail marshes. These marshes are very small areas in general. Some of the bigger ones may be up to 5 acres with the average being 1 or 2 acres. Nonetheless, I found plenty of 'rat houses in these same spots in years gone by. Today there are none.

I totally agree with the herbicide thing. I think it is the sole reason for what we are seeing.

[bobwendt]

ridge, I was interested to hear what you are seeing on the other critters. indiana is about reduced to tons of coon and coyotes and anything else just in pockets. we have the same number of squirrels but cottontails are near extinct here in the central part, and plenty good crp weed patches too. I see rabbit populations in the daggone western deserts measured in TON OF RABBITS/ acre, yet here, not hardly 1 rabbit/square mile. same deal, chemicals. the raptors and other predators are a zillion times more in the west and the habitat so sorry you are amazed anything lives on sand and sage and a sprig of buffalo grass once in a square yard and a few starving cactus. beats all you ever saw. oner thing the west doesn`t have wall to wall- corn or beans, and the acoompanying chemicals

[billkasten]

Bob what about human waste cleanup along the rivers?.We have several towns along the Susquehanna river that have put in treatment plants were the river was were this waste was dumped years ago when we had good rat numbers. Cleaning up the river seemed to change the plant life also . Most of the heavy farming has gone from this area . There is still some corn grown in the good ground. Just wondering if the clorine used to clean the waste could have had an affedt also. Were you could catch two hundred in the seventies now maybe ten .

[wbg]

Did any of you guys happen to read the article in TPC. a couple of months ago written by one of the experts, which basically stated that the high rat prices would finally prove that all the speculation on the demise of the muskrat was simply due to under trapping. What rock is this guy living under? I trapped South Jersey in the 70's and 80's, if I set 10 dozen traps it was very common to catch 80 or 90 rats the first night. naturally this would fall off after the first night, however there was no shortage of habitat to set up and I seldom left the traps in the same holes and runs more than 2 or 3 nights. This was not in the big costal marshes either, farm dicthes road side diches ect. Also some tidal creeks off the Delaware and rancocass. Today a guy would have a hard time doing that in a season in that country . These days I trap in maine and have since 92 and although I've never seen the numbers here like jersey was they have fallen off greatly in the last 7 years or so. Like Wendt said theres always been floods and drought and although there are more raptors today they could never control the number of rats we had in the 70's and 80's. Habitat loss, pesticides,heavy metal from mid west drift and here's A new one , a possible negitive interaction with the ever growing resident goose population

[dj88ryr]

billkasten said:

Bob what about human waste cleanup along the rivers?.We have several towns along the Susquehanna river that have put in treatment plants were the river was were this waste was dumped years ago when we had good rat numbers. Cleaning up the river seemed to change the plant life also . Most of the heavy farming has gone from this area . There is still some corn grown in the good ground. Just wondering if the clorine used to clean the waste could have had an affedt also. Were you could catch two hundred in the seventies now maybe ten .

I was a bait dealer back when I was in NH, we caught about 80% of what we sold. This is a fact, when they started strictly regulating septics and discharges into the rivers, the numbers of shiners plumetted. I am not saying polution is a good ting, but with the cleaner water and treatment plants, came less food for other species.

[MartyPhipps]

I was thinking a low rabbit population in the midwest might have something to do with feral house cats.