Rats are fascinating. A few species of rat have colonized niches provided by agrarian and industrial human societies; I blogged earlier in the year about the Polynesian rat and Easter Island – now it’s the wharf rat (my favorite name for R. norvegicus) and England’s turn. So… here’s a rat-catcher’s link farm:
- A really good book on ratting, Tales of a Rat-Hunting Man – part of Lyons and Burford’s ‘Wilder Places’ series. Any ‘Wilder Places’ title that you can find is guaranteed to be a good read – they were selected by Stephen Bodio.
- A link courtesy of Reid Farmer (on the Querencia blog) to Patrick Burns. Mr. Burns shows us an interesting connection between the rat pits of Victorian London and modern medicine.
- Finally – Full Revelations of a Professional Rat-catcher After 25 Years’ Experience – an electronic version(s) of an 1898 book by Ike Mathews.
…the only advantage to the mongoose being that all the Rats it kills it will bring back dead to it’s habitation, and that stops the dead Rats from smelling under the floors.
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Update (11/29) – a great post on Patrick Burn’s site – R. norvegicus prevents plague!