'Rock rabbits' becoming a pest in Israel

Hyraxes, sometimes knows as rock rabbits, are fuzzy, cute and, in Israel at least, becoming a serious pest in residential areas, scientists say.

The animals have moved into neighborhoods of Galilee and have been destroying people's gardens.

"They're coming into the villages and eating everything they can find," University of Haifa researcher Arik Kershenbaum told the BBC.

Scientists say they think they know why: hyraxes love to make their homes in the debris from building sites, where they can lounge in the sun and still stay close to their bolt holes.

"It turns out that it's the piles of boulders [created by clearing sites for building] that attract the hyraxes," Kershenbaum said.

"We confirmed that they're attracted to the boulder piles rather than heading specifically for people's gardens," he said.

Suburban wildlife-watchers are fond of the hyraxes but some people have called for a cull.

Nothing that drastic is needed, researchers say; simply filling in the boulder piles would drive hyraxes out of the villages and back to their usual homes in the surrounding cliffs.

That would be a solution in line with the Bible, which mentions the creatures.

Proverbs 30:26 of the King James Bible says, "The rock badgers are a feeble folk, yet they make their homes in the crags."

Smell of death could control invasive fish

A repellent for sea lampreys could be the key to controlling one of the most destructive invasive species in the Great Lakes, a researcher says.

Michigan State University researcher Michael Wagner says dramatic effects are seen when scents from dead sea lampreys are poured into a tank of live ones, with the live fish making frantic attempts to escape.

These reactions could be a potential game changer, he says.

"Sea lampreys are one of the most costly and destructive Great Lakes' invaders," said Wagner, whose study appears in the Canadian Journal of Fisheries and Aquatic Sciences.

"The effectiveness of the odor combined with the ease in which it's obtained suggests that it will prove quite useful in controlling sea lampreys in the Great Lakes."

A repellent, even in very small amounts, may prove to be more effective in diverting and corralling them, Wagner.

"It's kind of like a stop light, a noxious odor that causes them to run away from its source," he said. "By blocking certain streams with these chemical dams, sea lampreys can be steered away from environmentally sensitive areas and into waterways where pesticides could be used more effectively to eliminate a larger, more concentrated population of sea lampreys."