Anonymous wrote:We need more cats.

It's funny this thread came up today because in my facebook memories, I had photos from a trip I took to Amsterdam many years ago. My childhood friend lives there, and every restaurant we went to had a cat just wandering around! I had posted about that, and one of my other friends told me it was to keep the rats away!

Obviously the solution is for more restaurants and homes to have cats.

Anonymous wrote:Anyone remember ratgate: when DC wanted to "humanely" solve its rat problem by trapping all the rats, drive them across the river and release them along the GW Parkway in Virginia.

And Virginia was like "no f-ing way"

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The city should pay a cash bounty on dead rats.

Enterprising folks would pocket some serious $$$, and the rat population would be reduced. Not eliminated, but definitely reduced.

Right now there’s no incentive for anyone to do anything about getting rid of them. So incentivize it. Use economics to fight the problem. Assign a value to rats, and pay the people who turn them in.

This is a good idea. OP here - back in the rats in the sandbox days, we called city rat control twice. They came.in space suits, poked around for nests and left without doing anything. This was years ago... What are other cities doing? Any new methods? Sterilization??? I like the idea of leading them across the highway - very Pied Piper of Hamelin, but not super fair to our neighbors.

Pay $10 for each dead rat turned in to any designated collection site in the city. Homeless people would be catching and killing rats all day long.

$10 and the city would be bankrupt in a week . I'd start way lower. Maybe by the pound? I just threw up a little thinking about that...

I agree with you. There are many more than we think...
I remember returning cans and bottles in the 80s to the store for 5 cents each. People filled up carts... I guess it could work.
I worry about disease spreading--people catching them with their hands, rocks etc.

WHO would catch a rat with their hands for $10? So disgusting.

I wouldn’t bother catching 1 for $10.

But I’ll spend all night in an alley a few nights a month catching 100 for $1,000

I bet it could become weirdly satisfying. Like swatting flies. How would you catch them? Maybe they could pay by weight of the sack?

I grew up in Baltimore. There was a tradition there of rat-fishing, back when the city had a contest for killing rats every summer.

Kids (and adults) would use small fishhooks with peanut butter on them, and cast them in alleys or underneath dumpsters and other places. You’d hook the rat just like a fish, reel it in, club/stomp it, and get your prizes.


https://news.yahoo.com/way-back-wednesday-rat-fishing-173909215.html


Yeah. It really happened. It was a lot of fun, and got rid of a lot of rats back in the day.

WOW. Is this an urban legend?

No. Urban Legends are stuff that didn’t happen.

I’ve actually done this before when I was a kid.


Does that make me a legend?

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OMG, I'm going to have nightmares tonight. Add this to reason 1,483,719 why we no longer go to DC. How disgusting.

I remember the days when DCUM was actually populated by people who live in DC. Now we get this dribble on the daily.

"Dribble"? You mean opinions from people who live in the DC area but don't go into DC itself because of rats and violence? Aww. Truth hurts.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The city should pay a cash bounty on dead rats.

Enterprising folks would pocket some serious $$$, and the rat population would be reduced. Not eliminated, but definitely reduced.

Right now there’s no incentive for anyone to do anything about getting rid of them. So incentivize it. Use economics to fight the problem. Assign a value to rats, and pay the people who turn them in.

This is a good idea. OP here - back in the rats in the sandbox days, we called city rat control twice. They came.in space suits, poked around for nests and left without doing anything. This was years ago... What are other cities doing? Any new methods? Sterilization??? I like the idea of leading them across the highway - very Pied Piper of Hamelin, but not super fair to our neighbors.

Pay $10 for each dead rat turned in to any designated collection site in the city. Homeless people would be catching and killing rats all day long.

$10 and the city would be bankrupt in a week . I'd start way lower. Maybe by the pound? I just threw up a little thinking about that...

I agree with you. There are many more than we think...
I remember returning cans and bottles in the 80s to the store for 5 cents each. People filled up carts... I guess it could work.
I worry about disease spreading--people catching them with their hands, rocks etc.

WHO would catch a rat with their hands for $10? So disgusting.

I wouldn’t bother catching 1 for $10.

But I’ll spend all night in an alley a few nights a month catching 100 for $1,000

I bet it could become weirdly satisfying. Like swatting flies. How would you catch them? Maybe they could pay by weight of the sack?

I grew up in Baltimore. There was a tradition there of rat-fishing, back when the city had a contest for killing rats every summer.

Kids (and adults) would use small fishhooks with peanut butter on them, and cast them in alleys or underneath dumpsters and other places. You’d hook the rat just like a fish, reel it in, club/stomp it, and get your prizes.


https://news.yahoo.com/way-back-wednesday-rat-fishing-173909215.html


Yeah. It really happened. It was a lot of fun, and got rid of a lot of rats back in the day.

WOW. Is this an urban legend?

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The city should pay a cash bounty on dead rats.

Enterprising folks would pocket some serious $$$, and the rat population would be reduced. Not eliminated, but definitely reduced.

Right now there’s no incentive for anyone to do anything about getting rid of them. So incentivize it. Use economics to fight the problem. Assign a value to rats, and pay the people who turn them in.

This is a good idea. OP here - back in the rats in the sandbox days, we called city rat control twice. They came.in space suits, poked around for nests and left without doing anything. This was years ago... What are other cities doing? Any new methods? Sterilization??? I like the idea of leading them across the highway - very Pied Piper of Hamelin, but not super fair to our neighbors.

Pay $10 for each dead rat turned in to any designated collection site in the city. Homeless people would be catching and killing rats all day long.

$10 and the city would be bankrupt in a week . I'd start way lower. Maybe by the pound? I just threw up a little thinking about that...

I agree with you. There are many more than we think...
I remember returning cans and bottles in the 80s to the store for 5 cents each. People filled up carts... I guess it could work.
I worry about disease spreading--people catching them with their hands, rocks etc.

WHO would catch a rat with their hands for $10? So disgusting.

I wouldn’t bother catching 1 for $10.

But I’ll spend all night in an alley a few nights a month catching 100 for $1,000

I bet it could become weirdly satisfying. Like swatting flies. How would you catch them? Maybe they could pay by weight of the sack?

I grew up in Baltimore. There was a tradition there of rat-fishing, back when the city had a contest for killing rats every summer.

Kids (and adults) would use small fishhooks with peanut butter on them, and cast them in alleys or underneath dumpsters and other places. You’d hook the rat just like a fish, reel it in, club/stomp it, and get your prizes.


https://news.yahoo.com/way-back-wednesday-rat-fishing-173909215.html


Yeah. It really happened. It was a lot of fun, and got rid of a lot of rats back in the day.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The city should pay a cash bounty on dead rats.

Enterprising folks would pocket some serious $$$, and the rat population would be reduced. Not eliminated, but definitely reduced.

Right now there’s no incentive for anyone to do anything about getting rid of them. So incentivize it. Use economics to fight the problem. Assign a value to rats, and pay the people who turn them in.

This is a good idea. OP here - back in the rats in the sandbox days, we called city rat control twice. They came.in space suits, poked around for nests and left without doing anything. This was years ago... What are other cities doing? Any new methods? Sterilization??? I like the idea of leading them across the highway - very Pied Piper of Hamelin, but not super fair to our neighbors.

Pay $10 for each dead rat turned in to any designated collection site in the city. Homeless people would be catching and killing rats all day long.

$10 and the city would be bankrupt in a week . I'd start way lower. Maybe by the pound? I just threw up a little thinking about that...

I agree with you. There are many more than we think...
I remember returning cans and bottles in the 80s to the store for 5 cents each. People filled up carts... I guess it could work.
I worry about disease spreading--people catching them with their hands, rocks etc.

WHO would catch a rat with their hands for $10? So disgusting.

I wouldn’t bother catching 1 for $10.

But I’ll spend all night in an alley a few nights a month catching 100 for $1,000

I bet it could become weirdly satisfying. Like swatting flies. How would you catch them? Maybe they could pay by weight of the sack?

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OMG, I'm going to have nightmares tonight. Add this to reason 1,483,719 why we no longer go to DC. How disgusting.

I remember the days when DCUM was actually populated by people who live in DC. Now we get this dribble on the daily.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Why not have the homeless trap and kill the rats for some sort of bounty?

I'm not sure you can specify the homeless do it, but if you offered a bounty they'd surely get in on it and be quite effective. Back when you got 5 cents for a returned soda pop can you would see homeless with shopping carts and mounds of cans at the store turn-in. My grandma too - she was thrifty!

I would love if there were a bounty for faeces as well. Let's clean this city up!

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Why not have the homeless trap and kill the rats for some sort of bounty?

I'm not sure you can specify the homeless do it, but if you offered a bounty they'd surely get in on it and be quite effective. Back when you got 5 cents for a returned soda pop can you would see homeless with shopping carts and mounds of cans at the store turn-in. My grandma too - she was thrifty!

I would love if there were a bounty for faeces as well. Let's clean this city up!

Anonymous wrote:Why not have the homeless trap and kill the rats for some sort of bounty?