Gutter Press correspondents recently received news from Ukkalen IV, regarding a plague of snails that are having a significant effect on the agricultural industry there, with suspicions that foreign agents or capsuleers are behind the outbreak.
The snails have reportedly caused significant damage to leaf crops being grown on several plantations owned by Caldari Provisions, with harvests forecast to be down 5% on the previous year.
A planetologist working for Caldari Provisions had this to say: “The snails are a native species that does not normally pose a problem for our operations here. This surge in the numbers of them is difficult to explain, the weather this year has not been significantly different from the long term average, and other pest species populations have not changed.”
The possibility was raised that outside interference is behind the plague of snails, although there is no clear motive for why anyone would wish to cause such an occurrence.
Gutter Press agents interviewed a number of agricultural personnel to gather their opinions:
“We’re pretty far off the beaten track here, I do not see why any foreigner would attack our operations. I’m not sure that any foreigners would have even heard of Ukkalen.”, said one farm worker.
“It is known that some Gallentean cultures use snails in their cuisine. I’d expect some kind of Gallente snail fertility drug has been used here.”, said another farm worker.
“If it’s anything, it’s probably Megacorp politics at play. Whatever it is, it’s above my pay grade”, said a third worker.
“It’d just be like a capsuleer to drop snail eggs onto a planet via the customs office, as some kind of prank.”, was the opinion of an agricultural mechanic.
A Caldari Provisions spokesperson gave a statement reassuring customers that the snail incident would not adversely affect their supply commitments.
In other news, a source within the Caldari Navy Medical Service confirmed that the number of cases of gastrointestinal illness caused by “The Commander Kim Challenge” has reached 100,000. The challenge, a phenomenon on social media networks popular with young Navy recruits, involves consuming a number of dry ration bars in as short a time as possible. This has the potential to cause a number of gastrointestinal conditions, resulting in concerns being voiced in several Naval commands.
Gutter Press. News.
i saw what you did there …