Will Pest Control Get Rid of Rats — Catherine’s student essay
Rats are to here to stay. Rats have traversed the planet for over 50 million years and show no sign of extinction. They are prolific breeders and genetically gifted in their adaptation to harsh conditions. They can breed as early as five weeks old and remain fertile until they are two years old.
The gestation period is only three weeks as compared to the human nine months. A typical rat litter is produces between 6 to 20 offspring and the reproduction cycle exponentially continues. Rats are also very resilient and are said to survive without water for long periods of time. Rats can outlast a camel in their ability to go without water.
Rats, although feared by most humans, play a crucial part of our ecosystem. Rats are opportunistic eaters and often eat garbage. Predators also feed on them such as hawks, falcons, owls, and even the primarily herbivore javelina. They are able to spread and preserve vegetation in their ingestion of seeds. Cats, called “mousers”, in pre-industrialization, provided food and play to other species.
Rats play a role in the world food web as agents dispersing vegetation across vast areas of land. Rats are also revered in certain cultures making it unlikely that they will be permanently removed. In China the rat is the symbol of intelligence.
In the Chinese calendar those born in the year of the rat are considered ambitious and intelligent. The Year of the Rat is the most prominent in the Chinese zodiac cycle. Depictions of the Hindu god Ganesh often show him riding a rat.
The rat has an elevated status in Hinduism as the removal of obstacles due to their innate ability to gnaw through almost anything even steel. There is even a World Rat Day, created in by rat enthusiasts who see the contribution of this rodent into our society. Since the early 2000s, World Rat Day is celebrated on April 4th.
Rats because of their reproductive cycle and their close genetic connection to mammals are often the subject of scientific experimentation. Although, the use of rats, in scientific inquiry poses ethical questions they serve a significant benefit to the medical community.
Rats also carry disease and destroy property. The Medieval black plague is often contributed to the rat. Recent studies show that although rats carried the fleas and ticks spreading the plague, they were not the main cause. It is now believed that the plague spread too quickly for the blame to go to the rats. It was likely human to human exposure that caused the ravaging deaths.
On a personal level I recently experienced the impact of rats on humans. My cat, Hansen, an ardent house cat for 12 years escaped from the house for 10 minutes. He came back depositing a 6-inch rat on the doorstep of my family home. We were all repulsed; yet Hansen was very proud of himself. He still had the hunting instinct after years of human pampering. So again, rats are here to stay.