Odds and Ends

Getting Those Damn Rats Out of Alaska No, not those kind of rats.  And not really the whole state…but still, it’s a victory.  I’m talking about actual four-legged, snaggle-toothed, beady-eyed, bird-killin’ varmints.  The ignominiously named “Rat Island” appears to now be completely rat free.  I’ve been following this story for a while, so I was glad to hear that the latest news was good.  The down side to the rat eradication is that the poisoned pellets used to kill them also killed gulls and bald eagles in the process. Since Rat Island has been infested with rats for 230 years,…