Drones and M&M’s Help Vaccinate Endangered Ferrets; Future Tense via Slate, 7/14/16

Matt Miller, Future Tense via Slate; Drones and M&M’s Help Vaccinate Endangered Ferrets:

[Kip Currier: Following on the heels of the Facebook story below, another positive application of technology: specifically, the ingenius use of drones (much in the press over the past few years as a technology deployed for military/national security/reconnaissance purposes) in an 11th hour rescue of highly endangered North American black-footed ferrets from extinction in the wild.]

"The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service just announced a plan (h/t the Verge) to save wild ferrets in the Great Plains region using brilliant combination of drones and M&M’s candy. Endangered since 1967 and thought to be extinct twice, the black-footed ferret is one the rarest mammals in North America—just 300 are thought to live in the wild. According to the FWS, the “primary obstacle” to this species’ recovery is its susceptibility to a virus called the Sylvatic plague, similar to the bubonic plague in humans.

That’s where the drones come in.

To protect the ferrets from the plague, they need to be vaccinated. But tracking down wild animals is tough, which is why the FWS has partnered with private contractors to develop a vaccination delivery system in which unmanned aerial systems (aka drones) will fly above the ferrets’ territory in northeastern Montana and drop M&M’s candies coated with the vaccine in the area.

Strangely, it won’t be the ferrets eating the vaccine candy. Prairie dogs, which make up more than 90 percent of the ferrets’ diet and are thought to be the main source of infection for the ferrets, are the intended targets of the treats."