100 things challenge - 39: HeroRATS

[birdienl]

Rats are a nuisance, right? They carry diseases, eat animal feed and most people are just plain frightened of them. But, people in mine infested regions of Mozambique and Thailand are very grateful for the help of the trained African giant pouched rats to make their land safe again.

The Belgian NGO APOPO started training these rats to sniff out the scent of landmines and indicate their presence to their handler by scratching the ground. The insignificant weight of these rats mean the landmines won't detonate when the animals walk over them. The African giant pouched rats are longlived for rodents, they can reach an age of 6-8 years. 

The demining operations with the so-called HeroRATS started in 2004 in Mozambique and in 2010 a second project has started along the Thai-Cambodian border. In Mozambique, the operations have cleared 2,5 million square meter of land of the danger of mines. 

APOPO has also started a project to train these rats, with their exceptional olfactory abilities, to detect tuberculosis in human sputum samples. The project is still in the testing phase, but so-far it looks very promising: the rats can increase the TB detection rate by 43% compared to microscopy!

Comments

[msantimacassar.livejournal.com]

WOW! That is absolutely amazing!! Who knew?

[birdienl.livejournal.com]

Gotta thank my subscription to the wonderful BBC Wildlife Magazine for many of my animal-related facts I post here!

[msantimacassar.livejournal.com]

Awesome! What a handy magazine to have around - it must be fascinating!

[ever-maedhros.livejournal.com]

Wow. I'm speechless. It never fails to amaze how creative people can get. :)

[birdienl.livejournal.com]

May I respectfully disagree: it never fails to amaze how many awsome clever things there are in the animal and plant kingdoms that we can make use of!

How are you doing btw? Haven't seen a lot of posts from you lately.

[ever-maedhros.livejournal.com]

That is a very good way to respectfully disagree. :D I think you're right--the credit should go mostly to creation (and its Creator).

I'm trying to be better about posting, even if it's just random silly things--but then I get involved in a book or a TV show or a song. :)

[appaku.livejournal.com]

Since I mentioned it in a recent entry of mine, moonplanet linked me to this entry of yours. I'll just add to this by saying I've been sponsoring HeroRATs for a few years, and as an organization, they have excellent correspondence without the bulk mailings many other charities are guilty of. I love working with Apopo!

[birdienl.livejournal.com]

Thanks for stopping by! It does sound like a worthy cause to sponsor, I'll look into it.