URUMQI -- Rats are ravaging 380,000 hectares of grasslands in Northwest China's Xinjiang Uygur autonomous region, local authorities said on Thursday.

The plagued meadows are located in Ili prefecture, where the rodents have been destroying the grass, said Wang Wei, with the prefecture's office of locust and rat elimination.

The disaster was caused by a persistent drought in Ili river valley last year, the worst drought in the past 50 years, as rats are more adaptable to dry weather, according to Wang.

In Huocheng county, about 1,100 rat burrows are found in per hectare of grassland, and in Yining city, 390 in per hectare, he said.

The workers are killing the rats with rodenticide and attracting eagles to help hunt them.