Official News - page 3

MARSRATS AND OFFWORLD CATS

by Hazed

You don't have to travel outside of the Solar System to see just how adaptable Earth lifeforms are. Look closer to home, to the colonies on other Sol planets. The first inhabitants took with them plants and animals from Earth - sometimes unintentionally. Nuisance plants now have a foothold on most of the colonies, with the wheat fields of Rhea being particularly vulnerable to weeds. Amongst the unwanted animals that have found their way off mother Earth, perhaps the most pervasive of all the vermin is the rat, and nowhere has it spread further and faster than on Mars.

Can it be possible that the very first manned ships to land on Mars brought with them this unwanted pest? Certainly, before the first permanent colony on Mars celebrated its first birthday, rats were making their home on the red planet alongside the humans. Over time, the creatures have spread until they infest every part of the colony. No matter how great the effort put into wiping them out, they persist and continue to thrive. Over time they have evolved to take advantage of the specific conditions on Mars, until they are now considered by biologists to be a distinct species, the marsrat.

Vermin like the marsrat follows humankind around the Galaxy wherever they go, like it or not. Attempts to prevent animals and plants being taken off Earth except under controlled conditions have done little to prevent their spread - all it has done is make sure that only the unwanted Earth species have been exported.

Now, that policy is being reversed. In order to deal with these unwanted infestations, predator species are being deliberately introduced, and recently the Martian Council has decided to officially import some cats to the planet to try to deal with the marsrat problem. Whether they will make any inroads into the perennial problem of the marsrat infestation remains to be seen; but surely they will brighten up the streets of Mars!

A spokesdroid pointed out that these felines are intended to be working animals, not pets, so residents and visitors should refrain from trying to adopt them, but should let them go about their marsrat-extermination business. "Please do not try to pick them up, to stroke them, and above all don't feed them," it said. "Of course they will take food from you if you have it, but the intention is that they should kill and eat marsrats!"

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