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| -Short Attention Span Theater- |
| When animals attack . . . the grass? |
| 2006-12-16 |
| ASSATEAGUE ISLAND, Md. -- What do you do when one of your natural treasures starts eating all the others? That's the National Park Service's dilemma on this storied barrier island. Proof of its problem can be found on a spongy stretch of salt marsh, where one section is fenced off by barbed wire. Inside the fence, the island's native smooth cordgrass is growing thickly, a foot tall. Outside it, the grass is cropped nearly to the roots. "Inside. Outside. A lot different," said Mark Sturm, a Park Service ecologist, gesturing at the denuded muck. The culprit is obvious: There's only one animal on Assateague that can't get through the fence. "This is all horses," Sturm said. Yes. Those horses. About 140 wild ponies live on the Maryland half of the island -- less famous than their cousins in Virginia, who star in the annual Chincoteague pony penning, but still a major part of the Assateague mystique. Now, Park Service officials say, the horse population is eating away at the plants that underpin rare coastal ecosystems here. They're considering a radical solution: selling or relocating as much as a third of the Maryland herd. |
| Posted by:Mike |
| #2 Issue condoms. They probably feed the horses in the winter so they won't starve. |
| Posted by: KBK 2006-12-16 12:17 |
| #1 Dog Food comes to mind, make a profit, but you must do it very quietly. |
| Posted by: Redneck Jim 2006-12-16 10:16 |