Ratted Out

By Matt Wood in Miscellaneous on Nov 15, 2006 1:18PM

The city claims to be winning its war against rats, according to a Streets and Sanitation official. Spokesperson Matt Smith told the Sun-Times yesterday that citizen complaints about rats are down 14 percent from last year. Smith credits increased baiting efforts and the roll out of new garbage cans with tightly fitting lids. Chicagoist wrote about a rat and mice infestation at City Hall last year in which we also quoted Mr. Smith, and now we're sorry that he will forever be known to us at the Rat Guy. But if he's in charge of keeping those nasty buggers off our streets, then he can wear that mantle with pride.

We're a sucker for stories about animals, filthy or not, so we knew we would write about this as soon as we saw the headline. But what really hooked us was the wealth of rat trivia that reporter Andrew Herrmann packed into a mere 350 words. For instance, did you know:

• The primary food source for urban rats is dog poop.
• The city's rat population is currently around 500,000, but at one point in the ’80s it was between 6 and 7 million. Nationwide there is about one rat per person.
• Rats can't vomit.
• Rats don't sweat.
• Two rats can produce 2,000 descendants per year.
• Unlike goldfish, strangely, rats can survive being flushed down a toilet.

Who knew? The problem should only be getting better too, because the city passed an ordinance saying that buildings cannot be demolished until they are rat-free, eliminating the problem of mass exodus during tear-downs. And now, thanks to the Sun-Times-ipedia, you can also heap extra shame on your neighbors when you catch them not picking up after their puppy.

Image from Wikipedia