Black-winged Kites help farmers catch rats, and Qiu Jinghui teaches you DIY artificial perches

On an early Cold Dew afternoon, a sudden heavy rain interrupted the rhythm of plowing and making beds for the "minor winter" crop in the south. After the hot, rainy summer fallow period, winter crops such as red beans, radishes and cherry tomatoes are now being planted, making this a season of abundant vitality in the farmlands of the south. On the morning after the rain, on a large stretch of Taiwan Sugar Corporation farmland along Provincial Highway 3 south of the terminus of National Highway 10, a small group of smallholders practicing green conservation gathered, along with teachers and students from the Bird Ecology Research Laboratory of the Institute of Wildlife Conservation at National Pingtung University of Science and Technology. On a 15-hectare field area of Runhui Organic Farm, under the lively hosting of "Princess Black Kite" Lin Huishan, an event was held: "Invite the eagles to help catch rats - Black-winged Kite perch workshop and hands-on practice."

Rodent damage in the fields, a common problem for farmers

On both sides of Provincial Highway 3, on the vast Taiwan Sugar Corporation land at the border of Meinong and Qishan in Kaohsiung and Ligang in Pingtung, the crop most familiar to everyone is none other than the edamame known as green gold. Unlike corporate-style edamame farmers, Runhui Organic Farm mainly operates on a smallholder model, and in the past two years several young farmers have joined as a new force, growing pineapples, sweet potatoes, radishes, corn, tomatoes, black beans and more, with diverse crop types.

Also because no pesticides are applied, rodents run rampant. Farmer Zeng Qishang, who has planted here for many years, said: "At least more than fifty rat traps are lost every year." Xu Yajing, who has a field in Minong, said: "Last year every bunch of sweet potatoes bore teeth marks from rats." At the very start of the Black-winged Kite perch hands-on workshop, a rat put on a scene right there of carrying its young in its mouth to move house, which made Princess Black Kite deliberately lower her voice: "Don't let the rat hear."

For details and precautions, please link to: Invite Black-winged Kites to catch rats in the fields - Hands-on Practice (blog of the Bird Ecology Laboratory, Institute of Wildlife Conservation, NPUST)

Hosted by the Bureau of Animal and Plant Health Inspection and Quarantine of the Council of Agriculture, Section Chief Zhang Yunping of the Ecological Conservation Section of the Kaohsiung City Agriculture Bureau and Section Chief Yang Jiahong of the Agriculture Section of the Meinong District Office also came specially to observe and learn. It is hoped that this can be promoted to the fields in the future to achieve a rat-suppressing effect.