Leaf-blower becomes precision-guided weapon for mink catchers in Porkkalanniemi

Feral mink freed from fur farms by animal-rights activists devastate bird population and harm archipelago environment

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By Jere Malinen
     
      The serenity of the Porkkalanniemi bird sanctuary suffered a devastating blow in the early 1990s. In a fur-farm raid, animal rights activists freed some 3,000 mink onto the headland. Decent swimmers all, the beasts soon spread to the surrounding archipelago as well.
      “At first we tried to catch them with traps and snares, but this proved ineffective”, explains Seppo Elonperä.
      Elonperä belongs to a yachting society called Merikarhut (Old Salts), which owns a few islands in the Porkkalanniemi archipelago.
     
With the arrival of the feral mink population, the nesting of birds started to suffer.
      The first ones to disappear were the black guillemots (Cepphus grylle), which breed in communities in rocky sites near water.
      Soon other bird varieties in the archipelago also started exhibiting signs of suffering from the presence of the alien immigrants.
      The Porkkalanniemi promontory, which extends far out into the Gulf of Finland, is a real bird watcher’s paradise.
      Annually, tens of millions of birds breeding in the north migrate through this point.
     
Even on the last Monday of April, several bird enthusiasts in their customary army camo jackets observe the headland’s birds with their telescopes mounted at the side of the winding main road nearby.
      The sea is calm. After a 15-minute boat ride, the aluminium-framed vessel arrives at the dock at the Skrubbö island.
      At the highest point of the rocky island stands a Merikarhut base, a red cottage imitating an old pilot’s hut.
     
But the ten-man party have no time to delve into the architectural history of the building.
      A mink-hunting drive is about to start.
      Three German shorthaired pointers dash forward onto the island. The trained canines are directed with commands, hand signals, and whistles.
      “The pointers will not attack the prey. They merely indicate its hiding place”, emphasises Reijo Orava of the Uusimaa Game Management District, the owner of a ten-year-old German shorthaired pointer called Reni.
      Other kinds of dogs are out of the question, as the nesting of the common eider (Somateria mollissima) has already started. The birds are left alone. We are looking for mink - but so far, we cannot find any.
     
The next island is full of structures set up by the island’s former tenants - the Soviet military. This part of Finland housed a large Soviet base after World War II and into the 1950s (see links).
      “It's all superpower politics. The Soviets upped and left in January 1956. Now the buildings are occupied by the mink, whose roots are in the United States”, jokes Hans Holopainen of the Kirkkonummi Game Preservation Society.
     
Just then Reni freezes. The dog's front paw is in the air, while its nose points unerringly under a nearby wood shed.
      “Last autumn we caught a mink here”, Orava enthuses. The men armed with shotguns get into position around the building.
     
Orava powers up the group’s secret weapon.
      A couple of years ago the Finnish Association for Nature Conservation roundly condemned the garden leaf-blower as the most unnecessary device of the year.
      In mink hunting, however, the apparatus has proved the precision-guided smart weapon of nature conservation.
      The air flow should chase the beast out of its hideaway.
      Instead, a common merganser (Mergus merganser) storms out angrily from under the shed.
      This is a good sign. There are no beasts in the vicinity. In the afternoon, after four visited islands, the result is the best possible. Zero mink. In October, four animals were caught on the same islands.
     
The strange iceless winter of 2007/2008 has scored one for the birds.
      No new mink have made it to the small islands to replace the ones that have been killed there. Instead, there are dozens of eider nests.
      This summer the breeding might just prove successful.
     
The mink originates from North America. In fur farming it was introduced here in the 1920s.
      The first mink observations - escaped animals - in the Finnish countryside were made in 1932. The mink started becoming more common in the 1950s and '60s.
      In the Finnish archipelago, the alien invader mink - faced with no natural predators - is a threat to bird life, small mammals, amphibians, and reptiles.
      In addition to the environmental toxins, the eutrophication of the Baltic Sea, and the increased recreational yachting, the researchers have named the feral mink issue as one of the most severe problems threatening the fragile environment of the archipelago.
      The problem can be reduced by effective mink hunting and future prevention of vandalism against fur-farms.
     
Helsingin Sanomat / First published in print 3.5.2008


Previously in HS International Edition:
  Kokkola mink farm raid could cost EUR 300,000 in damage (24.9.2003)
  Nearly 8,000 mink released into wild late Sunday; most animals recovered (23.9.2003)
  300 mink set free in fur farm raid (21.4.2004)

See also:
  Return of Porkkala by Soviets 50 years ago had strings attached (25.1.2006)
  Sixty years ago: Parliament within range of Soviet guns (5.10.2004)

Links:
  Mink (Wikipedia)
  Porkkala (Wikipedia)

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