Rats in DC - will we have typhus soon like LA?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I am a foreigner and I feel like Americans don't care about rats or mice. They try to control the number of cats (try to adopt one and you will see!), but not rats. Jerry is a hero, Tom is the villain. Mickey, Stuart Little, and Ratatouille are all American creations, great childhood heroes.

In my country, it is not okay to have rats running on your backyard overnight. Here, it's common and it doesn't even matter if it's in a wealthy or poor neighborhood.

That being said, maybe a typhus outbreak would solve this problem.

We might need to go there. Or bounties for skins? Does dcs animal humane laws of catch and release apply.to rats? I'm shocked that in 2019 no one has developed a way to sterilize them??? So gross. They totally play where kids play in DC - watch out for those sandboxes.

where are you from? I find paris to be dirtier and more trash filled and dog shit covered than DC.

I mean…tons of large cities in the US and Europe are dirtier or as dirty as DC. They likely have rat problems too. In fact I have friends in family in much smaller cities that have dealt with rat problems on their property. That’s not really relevant to whether DC needs to try to less its rat population though.

[Anonymous]

The rats in DC are on the move. We are seeing them in more and more places, not just near restaurants.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I am a foreigner and I feel like Americans don't care about rats or mice. They try to control the number of cats (try to adopt one and you will see!), but not rats. Jerry is a hero, Tom is the villain. Mickey, Stuart Little, and Ratatouille are all American creations, great childhood heroes.

In my country, it is not okay to have rats running on your backyard overnight. Here, it's common and it doesn't even matter if it's in a wealthy or poor neighborhood.

That being said, maybe a typhus outbreak would solve this problem.

A friend of mine was biking home after work when a huge rat jumped on his leg. He fell off and broke his leg.

Clearly the problem here is that your friend was a cyclist. The rat did the world a favor. Entitled jerks.

[Anonymous]

Baiting, poisoning, trapping, birth control etc do not do anything against rats if there is food out at night. You can kill 95% of rats in a couple block area, but if there is food for remaining, the 5% remaining will eat it and will reproduce in numbers and rates to come back to high population in a matter of a few weeks.

It is very important to combat the idea that cities automatically come with rats. DC is now third or fourth in rat population out of 200 US cities. The causal problem in DC is that all restaurants in DC know there is no inspection or ticketing of commercial garbage overflow at night. So the rats can freely feed all night from the half the DC restaurants that habitually leave garbage out in open containers, overflowing containers, or plastic bags right on the ground overnight.

Secondarily, virtually all of the "streatery" planforms are wood or plastic with gaps chewed in them. The DPW and DOT works do not want to even lift them a bit since they are full of rats. They are a big part of the increase.

[Anonymous]

Who feeds these rats?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I am a foreigner and I feel like Americans don't care about rats or mice. They try to control the number of cats (try to adopt one and you will see!), but not rats. Jerry is a hero, Tom is the villain. Mickey, Stuart Little, and Ratatouille are all American creations, great childhood heroes.

In my country, it is not okay to have rats running on your backyard overnight. Here, it's common and it doesn't even matter if it's in a wealthy or poor neighborhood.

That being said, maybe a typhus outbreak would solve this problem.

A friend of mine was biking home after work when a huge rat jumped on his leg. He fell off and broke his leg.

OMG, if this is real, this is the stuff my nightmares are made of.

On a related note, a friend of mine had a squirrel run through the spokes of his front wheel when riding. The squirrel got picked up by the wheel and completely obliterated when he hit the fork, and my fried got thrown head first over the handlebars and broke his shoulder.

[Anonymous]

My cat kills at least 1 rat every night. I know because he leaves the bodies in a specific spot in my yard. I always give him a pat on the head and tell him he's a good boy.

[Anonymous]

The rats also love DC's vibrant streeteries.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Who feeds these rats?

Streeteries, among other sources.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Baiting, poisoning, trapping, birth control etc do not do anything against rats if there is food out at night. You can kill 95% of rats in a couple block area, but if there is food for remaining, the 5% remaining will eat it and will reproduce in numbers and rates to come back to high population in a matter of a few weeks.

It is very important to combat the idea that cities automatically come with rats. DC is now third or fourth in rat population out of 200 US cities. The causal problem in DC is that all restaurants in DC know there is no inspection or ticketing of commercial garbage overflow at night. So the rats can freely feed all night from the half the DC restaurants that habitually leave garbage out in open containers, overflowing containers, or plastic bags right on the ground overnight.

Secondarily, virtually all of the "streatery" planforms are wood or plastic with gaps chewed in them. The DPW and DOT works do not want to even lift them a bit since they are full of rats. They are a big part of the increase.

From the broken, ugly condition of the Jersey barriers that "protect" the streatery platforms, the rats may be chewing gaps in the concrete also!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Who feeds these rats?

anyone you see throwing bread to pigeons is feeding rats unintentionally, though they're not the main reason we have a rat problem.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Baiting, poisoning, trapping, birth control etc do not do anything against rats if there is food out at night. You can kill 95% of rats in a couple block area, but if there is food for remaining, the 5% remaining will eat it and will reproduce in numbers and rates to come back to high population in a matter of a few weeks.

It is very important to combat the idea that cities automatically come with rats. DC is now third or fourth in rat population out of 200 US cities. The causal problem in DC is that all restaurants in DC know there is no inspection or ticketing of commercial garbage overflow at night. So the rats can freely feed all night from the half the DC restaurants that habitually leave garbage out in open containers, overflowing containers, or plastic bags right on the ground overnight.

Secondarily, virtually all of the "streatery" planforms are wood or plastic with gaps chewed in them. The DPW and DOT works do not want to even lift them a bit since they are full of rats. They are a big part of the increase.

This is so true. They also need more people working for DPW and DDOT. My friend said 311 told him that both of those agencies are severely understaffed and that’s why they aren’t monitoring those things like they should. Honestly, the city should just send people free bait and traps. People could do more on their own

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:My cat kills at least 1 rat every night. I know because he leaves the bodies in a specific spot in my yard. I always give him a pat on the head and tell him he's a good boy.

Aren’t you worried about your cat getting rabies? Also I think most of these outdoor activities or feral cats are scared of the rats.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My cat kills at least 1 rat every night. I know because he leaves the bodies in a specific spot in my yard. I always give him a pat on the head and tell him he's a good boy.

Aren’t you worried about your cat getting rabies? Also I think most of these outdoor activities or feral cats are scared of the rats.

Cats get rabies vaccines. You wouldn't use indoor/outdoor pet cats for this probably, although even their presence and smell of their pee would deter the rats. There are feral cats that are captured, neutered, vaxxed and released to work on rodent problems in some rural settings. There are rat terrier dogs also used for this, but they have to be scheduled and accompanied by exterminators. We may need to do similar in the parts of the cities with out of control problems in addition to poisons and traps and cementing rat holes and cleaning garbage.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Lady, if you're not the same poster who wrote about sneaking around to put out rat poison at her surrounding areas of business, you really should get together with her. That would be amazing.

No, I didn't even see it. And I see many rat traps on the business around me. The residents and the DC mayor are the problems.

Ot seems theres a handful of us in DC who dont much care for rats....

No doubt about that! You have company - and I can imagine how dirty is your house.

DC is #5 rattiest cities in U.S.:

https://patch.com/district-columbia/washingtondc/most-rat-infested-cities-washington-dc-top-5

That is too high! I am scared to throw trash out cans ever since I saw a rat jump out of a bin.