Posts Tagged ‘rats’
D.C. has rats…
I’m speaking of the four-legged variety, though there is certainly an abundance of the two-legged type as well. New York City had a rat population explosion a few years back, and it turned out that so many of the immigrants living there came from cultures where municipal trash collection was a largely unknown experience that most of them did what they had done in their previous homes – threw the trash where they pleased. I have no idea whether D.C. has that many immigrants, but from having lived there for a couple of years, I can tell you that, as in New Orleans, money can purchase blindness and ignorance.
Cats vs rats…
Has New York City found the solution to its huge rat population? The NYC Feral Cat Initiative traps wild cat colonies which have become a nuisance or been threatened by construction, then vaccinates them. The goal is to return them to their home territory, but some end up in areas overrun by rats, where they prove uniquely useful.
The Humane Society of New York and the ASPCA spays or neuters them free of charge, and the locations they inhabit feed them and keep an eye out for them. Since the feral feline population is estimated to be half a million, it’s a way to care for the cats while helping to control the rodents.
Anywhere you have people, you have garbage, and you will have rats and mice. Too many New Yorkers just toss things on the ground, and sadly some of the immigrant population come from cultures where that is simply normal behavior because municipal garbage collection is unknown.
Rat smell lingers…
I’m afraid that when I saw the headline, my first thought was that they meant the lingering stench of corruption left over from the Clintons’ time in the Arkansas governor’s mansion, but no, it referred to an actual infestation of rats. For those uninitiated in the smelly arts, rats mark their trails by urinating, and the smell does indeed linger most unpleasantly. Good luck to the Hutchinsons in getting rid of it.
Hunting in New York…
Nice to see that dog owners in New York City are stepping in to help out where the Health Department has failed so miserably. Besides, none of these people are among the well-connected allowed to own guns…
Ruined by rats…
The scene of one of my favorite childhood books is about to be bombed with poison to get rid of the rats overrunning it. My island of Montecristo is ruined! Wouldn’t it have made more sense to set about a dozen cats loose?
Time for Thorns 