The paddy nurseries across the Diviseema region — Koduru, Nagayalanka and Avanigadda — are wearing a dry look due to rat menace.
The farmers’ hope of a bountiful paddy yield in the Kharif 2018 because of timely rain and water from the Godavari brought to Krishna this year maybe dashed with the rats eating away the seed sprayed in the field. Farmers are spending sleepless nights in tackling the menace. “In the half-acre nursery being raised for sowing the paddy plants in eight acres, the average number of the catch of the rats is 50-60 per week. They damage the crop at every stage. Guarding the nursery is a big challenge now,” farmer Gajula Ramudu told The Hindu . Some farmers who could afford to engage rat killers would be able to save their nurseries. The rat killer charges for each rat trapped.
Delay in supply of rodenticide
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The Agriculture department has procured 2,086 kg ‘Bromadiolone’, a rodenticide. “We have procured it. However, it is being tested in the laboratory and will be supplied within two weeks,” Joint Director P. Mohana Rao said. “The rodenticide should be used in a stretch of fields. Otherwise, the rats will go to another area and damage the nursery,” said the farmers. Unless the farmers resort to the mass killing, the menace could not be addressed.