As the rising sun danced across Florida's coastal waters, government workers in shorts and T-shirts knelt in a grassy island field and plucked wriggling rats from traps laid the night before. These weren't just any rats. They were 3-pound, 35-inch-long African behemoths. They squirmed as the workers, wearing protective gloves, removed green radio collars that had been tracking the rodents' movements.
Darin Carroll kept a watchful eye on that dawn mission at Florida's Grassy Key Island. Carroll is no ordinary G-man. He's a disease hunter determined to stop the next outbreak.
Darin Carroll kept a watchful eye on that dawn mission at Florida's Grassy Key Island. Carroll is no ordinary G-man. He's a disease hunter determined to stop the next outbreak.
His quest is to prove what many scientists suspect: that African rodents imported as pets caused a monkeypox outbreak in the Midwest in 2003 that sickened dozens of adults and children with a virus related to smallpox. Scientists suspect Gambian rats may play a role.
Mama mia, that's one big rat. I wonder if Mocha-momma would let us add one of these to our menagerie. I don't think that's gonna fly. I bet the gators down there in FL love these for in-between meal snacks.
2 comments:
*Gasp!*
ROUS's are real!
I wasn't sure, so I asked Mocha-momma, what were those things called in Princess Bride, she loves the movie. She immediately popped out: rodents of unusual size.
I think her favorite line was: by boys, have fun storming the castle.
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