* Mice: Isla Guadalupe

MICE: ISLA GUADALUPE

“The house mouse is apparently very abundant all over the island; specimens were collected which do not differ from individuals of other lands. The species probably came accidentally with personal baggage, has increased enormously, and probably will completely exterminate the land shell fauna. Probably numerous species of insects have already disappeared through this agency. The cats, of course, will not eat the mice as long as they can subsist on birds. ” HANNA, G Dallas 1922

Island Collections~

ISLAND	COLLECTOR	INSTITUTION	DATE	NUMBER	SPECIMEN
Isla Guadalupe	C. P. Streator	USNM	May 22, 1892	USNM-34085	Mus musculus	Mammals
Isla Guadalupe	Wilmot W. Brown	MCZ	April 28, 1906	MCZ-12085	Mus Musculus	Mammals
Isla Guadalupe	Wilmot W. Brown	MCZ	April 30, 1906	MCZ-12084	Mus Musculus	Mammals
Isla Guadalupe	Wilmot W. Brown	MCZ	May 3,1906	MCZ-12082	Mus Musculus	Mammals
Isla Guadalupe	Wilmot W. Brown	MCZ	May 3,1906	MCZ-12083	Mus Musculus	Mammals
Isla Guadalupe	Wilmot W. Brown	MCZ	May 17,1906	MCZ-12086	Mus Musculus	Mammals
Isla Guadalupe	A. W. Anthony	AMNH	July 16, 1923	AMNH-68670	Mus musculus	Mammals
Isla Guadalupe	A. W. Anthony	AMNH	July 13, 1924	AMNH-68671	Mus musculus	Mammals

In the News~

July 14, 1877 [SBMP]: “...The Island. Guadalupe Island may be described as a great pile in the ocean, apparently a volcanic upheaval — a mountain from eight to twelve miles wide and twenty-five or thirty miles long, its surface marked and seamed by high sharp ridges, sugarloaf peaks, deep canyons, bold bluffs and one broad basin (Spring Valley), with a main ridge running from the northern point far towards the southern end, where the land slopes down to the sea. The surface is stony — sandstone, scoria, or lave cropping out everywhere, with a rich red, loamy soil, the wash of ages, packed between, out of which springs a rich growth of herbage. Splendid cedar and pine groves are numerous in the northern and central parts; majestic live oak and hemlock trees grow on the west side, and the canyons are lined with thousands of beautiful broad-leaved palm trees of the species Brahea edulis, bearing fruit. The trees (which are all old, the young shoots being eaten out as fast as they come up,) are from thirty to forty feet high and twelve to fifteen inches in diameter of trunk. The fruit clusters are three to four feet in length, each weighing forty or fifty pounds. The fruit is eaten by goats, jacks, birds, mice, and even by men. These splendid palm trees give the canyons and slopes where they grow a decidedly tropical look...”

February 4, 1879 [San Francisco Bulletin]: “Guadalupe Island....The island is under the jurisdiction of the Mexican Government, and is owned by Messrs. Flint, Boswell & Abbott, the last named member of the firm being Hon. C. S. Abbott of Salinas City...The island is overrun with mice, there being one, it is said, to every square inch of surface. As an offset to the mice, there are thousands of cats which have multiplied from tame cats turned loose there at some former period of time, and are as wild as they make them. Except for goats, cats and mice are the only animals found on the island. The party counted fourteen different kinds of birds, but saw no centipedes, tarantulas, snakes or other reptiles, and observed only one spider during their stay of four months...”

July 1, 1885 [San Diego Union]: “At the Academy of Sciences in San Francisco last week Rev. M. Green delivered the first of a series of lectures on the islands off the coast of Lower California, where he had been sent by the Academy to take scientific researches. He stated that Guadalupe Island, 100 miles from the mainland of San Diego, is several miles in extent, in the shape of a large table land, 3,000 feet high. Goats are quite numerous, while the island is literally overrun by cats and mice. No one seems to know how the one lone donkey got there. It contains some timber, the highest trees being fifty feet in height. A few fruit trees still exist, but are fast dying out. The island is said to be the summit of a submarine mountain chain. It will be remembered that Rev. Green set out from San Diego on this expedition to the Guadalupe Islands and was accompanied by Prof. Dunn, of San Luis Rey.”