The St. Mary banner. (Franklin, Parish of St. Mary, La.) 1889-1931, 1906-05-05
Ian Is A CRIMINAL RAT.
DENMARK STARTS CAMPAIGN TO
TERMINATE THESE YER
MIN.
Partly as Precaution Against Plague
and Partly to Protect Butter Tubs
Their Depredatiors Growing Seri-
Gus in England.

The Danes, who spare no trouble tC
protect their important butter indus
Try. have lately undertaken national
campaign against rats. This has
been done partly as precaulon
against plague breaking out in their
seapcrts, and partly because butter
tubs are particularly attractive 20
rats; for there is nothing more dis
gusting than the thought that these
filthy animals may have been in con
tact with SO absorbent and easily
tainted an article of food.
! In England. on the other hand. no
/ concerted effort is made to check the
/ rat plague. The animals are increas-
! ing everywhere, to the detriment OF
agriculturists, poultry owners, game
i farmers, and not less so of our Brit
ish wild birds of many kinds.
The percentage of linnets. bull
/ tinches. warblers, and other nests Of
our smaller birds, the eggs Of which
are eaten by rats, is very large, as
any one may prove who seeks for
them and watches the fate of the
nests. They also act as serious
check on the increase of wild fowl
which began after the protection acts
were passed.
Rats prefer the eggs Of wild ducks
and marsh birds to any other food.
and case was lately mentioned in
which the owner Of a Wild duck farm
found thirteen ducks eggs in the hole
CT one doe rat In the month of OctO-
Der there is a great movement of
these animals from the east coast in
land
On shooting estate lately visited
by the writer, where iacessant trap
ping keeps them al bay. an October
invasion is always expected; and as
the whole property is kept carefully
under observation, the direction from
which they cross the frontier is we'll
known.
1t is very probable that this march
Of the mischievous is partly due to
the closure of the main herring fish
cry on the coasts of Norfolk and Suf-
folk about the time, and that the in
crease of the rats is not unconnected
with the eXceptionally large catches
of herring made during the past few
seasons.
The shoals of behring's have passed
all previous recorns. and some six
hundred Scatch women have been en-
gagged in cleaning" the fish. Some
times the refuse is very properly saw
ed for fish manure. But the garbage
of countless numbers of behring's is
thrown away. and this attracts and
keeps fat the rats in the late sum-
mer and early autumn.
When the source of supply grows
less, the creatures move inland. In
Norfolk this was aggravated a few
years ago by severe flood in parts
Of the fen. This drove out tens of
thousands Of rats from the low land
to the higher ground. The plague was
such that on one seate the keepers
We're afraid to go to one wood at
night, SO numerous and bold were
the creatures. 1t was not until after
weeks of wholesale poisoning and
trapping that their numbers We're re-
duced
But they had come to stay and sew
eral circumstances aided them in |
their resolution. Not the least i'm |
Dortant item in the rats favor was |
the almost universal spread Of pleas
ant preserving and pheasant rearing
On preserves the pheasants are sup
piled, often Overlavishly, with arti-
fetal food all the year round. The
quantity Of meal scattered for the
Young pheasants, and of Indian corn
thrown out to keep the birds at
such that it makes a considerable
tenn in the profits of local corn
iealers.
It is given with the greatest regu-
arlty every day. and the rats will
llways have their share, coming out
n the most impudent way and feed
ng among the pheasants If the
,eepers are slack in their duty, every
'heasant preserve becomes a rat pre-
erve. On the partridge manors it is
o impossible to allow the rat to in
rease. and to exercise it's egg-steal-
rs power in spring, that. as a rule.
he vermin are kept at bay
Another factor in the dispersion
nd hardening of these pests is the
lodern plan of building the corn
talks in the field from which the
heat has been reaped, instead Of
ringing 1t all home to the rickyard.
sa5es the loss of time and the ex-
ense of carting the loads to the
There is also less risk
the whole harvest being destroyed
Y fire. But every one of these iso-
ted stacks scattered over the face
the country makes a comfortable
n1f ipcy I