Yorkville enquirer. [volume] (Yorkville, S.C.) 1855-2006, 1907-06-11
Misfellansuus Rsaains.
METHODS OF DESTROYING RATS.
Department of Agriculture Studying
the Subject.

Department of Agriculture Studying
the Subject.
The United States department Of
agriculture will soon issue a farmers
bulletin entitled, Methods Of De-
stroying Rats" prepared under the
supervision of the chief Of the bureau
of biological survey, by D. E. Lantz,
assistant biologist. The topic Is Of pc
rennial interest, and an infallible
! method of destroying these rodents
would be worth more to the people of
the United States in a single decade
than the department Of agriculture
has cost since its establishment.
One rat is much like another 80 far
as destructiveness goes, but It is Of in
terest to note that three kinds have
appeared in this country, all immi-
grants from the Old World. The black
rat was the first to reach our shores,
which it did nearly three hundred
years ago. The common species,
known as the brown, or Norway, rat
arrived about the year 1775 and at
once proceeded to drive out its weaker
rival until almost everywhere 1t has
supplanted 1t. The third species,
known as the roof, or Alexandrine,
rat Of Egypt, is a great mariner and
infests every ship; hence, naturally
| 1t Is common along our coast, espe-
cially in the south.
,.ots ora lop fnaa httt fha
brown rat is the worst mammalian
pest in existence, and in the United
States destroys more property than all
other noxious animals combined. No
statistics of the actual damage annu-
ally done by these rodents has been
gathered in America. In Denmark
the loss is put at $3,000,00O year, and
in France the damage by both rats
and mice has been estimated at $40,-
100000 annually. A single rat VIII
consume about two ounces Of wheat
or corn day, and 1t destroys far more
than 1t eats, as indeed, 1t does OF most
other food. The average cost to the
country Of feeding a rat on grain Is
about so cents year. II for each
cow, horse, sheep and hog on the
farms Of the United States the farm
ers support one rat on grain, the toll
levied on the cereals by these rodents
would reach the enormous total Of
800, 100000 a year. Even granting
that half their food Is waste material,
the tax Of feeding rats Is still an enor-
nous drain on the profits Of agricul-
ture.
But much Of their food Is more ex-
pensive than grain, and the actual
losses due to these animals are by no
means confined to food. They enter
stores and ware houses and destroy
dry goods, lace curtains. carpets, WOOL
lens, silks-as we'll as kid gloves and
other leather goods. They gnaw
through lead pipes, flooding buildings
with water or filing them with gas.
They injure furniture and the foun-
dations and doors of buildings. They
eat the insulation from electric wires,
thus causing disastrous fires. The av-
erage fire loss in the United States due
to defective insulation is placed at
SIS, 100000 annually, a considerable
part of which is said to be caused by
rats.
Rats destroy eggs and young poul-
try, pigeons, game birds and wild song
birds. They have been known to kill
young rabbits, pigs, lambs, and even
to attack children. Carl Hagenbeck
once lost three young elephants be-
cause rats gnawed their feet, inflict-
ing incurable wounds.
In addition to the direct damage
they do, rats are known to be active
agents in carrying disease germs from
house to house and from city to city.
Bubonic plague Is usually dissemina-
ted from port to port in this way.
Their prolificness Is the chief obsta-
Gle to their determination. They pro-
duce young from three to six times a
year, and females breed when about
three months old. The average litter
Is about ten, but often it numbers
fourteen or more. If three litters Of
ten each are produced every year, a
single pair, breeding without check
and without losses by death in three
years would be represented by ten
generations, and would number 2O,-
155,392 individuals. The eleventh
generation, due at the beginning OF
the fourth year, would number over a
hundred millions.
The world has been fighting rats for
several centuries, but the warfare has
| been neither systematic nor persist
ent. The number Of 'infallible" de-
vices and formulas for killing the ro-
dents that have been put forth would
fill volumes, and still the pestiferous
rat survives and grows more and
more cunning as the devices for its
destruction gain in ingenuity.
The biological survey does not pre-
tend to have worked out an infallible
device for killing rats by wholesale,
but the methods for their destruction
given in the bulletin are those which
careful experiments have shown to be
the best, and the formulas for poison
ing and trapping them are the most
approved ones. Particular emphasis
is placed on the rat-proof construc-
ton Of buildings and on organized CO.
operative efforts to destroy the anil
mals.-P. H. Meg. in News and Cour-
Ter.
THE GllA MONSTER.