#BTSpeakingOut – Destructive pests

Disclaimer: The views and opinions expressed by the author(s) do not represent the official position of Barbados TODAY. 

by Rollins Howard

According to Webster’s New Universal Unabridged Dictionary a ‘pest’ is ‘a plague, pestilence; person or thing that causes trouble, annoyance, discomfort etc; nuisance, any destructive insect or other small animal or vermin’. It describes ‘vermin’ as ‘small animals with filthy, destructive, troublesome habits’.

Collins Gem English Dictionary describes a ‘pest’ as ‘an annoying person, insect or animal that damages crops’. The Ministry of Agriculture and Food and Nutritional Security, as well as its previous incarnations, has listed African snails as pests and has accordingly distributed bait and offered monetary rewards to the general public to assist in their eradication.

It has also collaborated with the Ministry of Health and Wellness which has determined that rodents, and especially rats, are also pests and every year they have distributed poison to businesses and householders, as well as provided bait stations throughout the island with particular emphasis on those areas where the rodents are likely to be found, eg, food stalls, supermarkets, public markets etc. These actions have been taken by these agencies to rid the island of these pests because they recognise the damage which these pests can cause to the health, finances and general well-being of the entire population.

These eradication methods have been rewarded with satisfying degrees of success throughout the years and continue unabated.

If we accept as truth the above definitions taken from the dictionaries, we will realise that there is another pest which plagues our island.

Almost every day our farmers, professional or backyard, can be heard complaining about the predations of other pests, some of a two-legged variety and others of the four-legged kind.

We are proscribed by law and moral ethics from adopting the same methods used to eradicate the snails and rats to combat the two-legged variety but although a bounty of fifteen dollars is offered for each monkey tail it is quite apparent that the monkeys have their own champions despite the havoc which they wreak on the farmers’ produce.

Whether we like it or not, or even if we consider them to be cute and cuddly, the fact remains that monkeys are pests in every sense of the word.

“It is distressing to see big hard-backed men reduced to the point of tears as they gaze in amazement at the destruction which these animals have wrought on their fields and to see their hard-earned labour as Bajans say ‘gone into Maxwell’s pond’.

Culling is a method which is used with great results in other countries to control the proliferation of pests and other invasive species and is quite preferable to their total eradication. Another method which has been used is neutering of the males to assist in controlling the expanding population.

Whatever method is used it is time for a firm decision to be made for controlling the monkey population in Barbados.

We cannot allow these pests to exist to the detriment of our human population especially at this time when the rallying cry is to boost our local supply of food and decrease our dependency on imported goods.

We must put mechanisms in place to support our local farmers. We cannot allow them to continue suffering at the hands (or paws) of these pests. There has been enough monkeying around with this monkey business.