The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1885-1921, 1908-09-24
RAT CAMPAIGN
IS DOING WELL
Guns and Traps Did Up 825 Last
Week---Pr0gress Reported
From Cattery.

| The war against the rat is being mer
cilessly waged by the Board of Health
and the United States quarantine ser
vice, trap and gun being kept busy
For the week ending September 19 the
number of scalps taken by the authori
| ties amounted to S25, of which number
of rats 587 stuck their feet into traps
and 238 fell before the unerring aim
of the shotgun specialists.
| This is satisfactory showing, but
much more satisfactory IS the fact that
$50 of these dead rats were bacteria
! logically examined and not one found
to be infected with bubonic germs.
Very satisfactory, too, is the fact
that each rat; properly dead and tagged
for Identification purposes, cost, deliv-
cred at the quarantine laboratory, only
twelve and a quarter cents. These are
the official figures supplied the Board
of Health by DR.. Currie, who is in COM
: mand of the rat exterminators, and
when compared to what the market
price of registered rats has been else
where it can be seen what bargains
these are. In Seattle, for instance,
when the rat war was on, it cost the
United tSates government a dollar and
a half per rat, regular Klondike prices.
noticeable thing about the Homo
lulu rats is that they are in nowise
bigoted, the tree rat sometimes prefer
ring the ground and the ground rat
sometimes visiting his arboreal breth-
"a ro+ Of hn Pot 70 1nr
instance, did considerable amount of
tree climbing last week, no fewer than
forty-one having been bird-shotted out
of their leafy retreats, while the mum
Der who fell by the wayside in the
ground traps set was 1872. The Mus
Alexandrinus, whose home is among
the bird perches, ran into fftyseven
ground traps through being where he
had no business to be, while 147 stay
at-homes fell victims to the sharp
shooters. The Norway rat, who never
climbs a tree, contributed thirty-seyen
of their number to the trappers, and
301 Mus musculus did the same.
In addition to the shotgun brigade
out in force and the fifteen hundred
odd traps that are being set daily for
the feet of the unwary rat, the Federal
authorities are busy with their eattery,
the trained ratters from which they
will before very long let loose against
the whole mus population. In the matches
on Quarantine Island are now gathered
together the fiercest of the feline pop
ulation of the city, some Toms which
weigh in at eight pounds fighting
weight, and a number of Tomasinas
whose teeth and claws have survived
them as the fttest of a whole genera
tion. Already the fighting progeny of
these fighting sires have begun to get
their eyes open, and the demand from
the island for meat, raw and bloody, as
a weaving diet for the kittens, is grow
ing. Before long the kittens will be
given rats to eat, dead ones to start
on, and hnally, when they are not so
wobbly on their legs, live ones. Il is
the idea of those responsible for tie
eattery that if this first generation is
brought up on fresh rat as a steady |
liet and if the population of the cat
terry is forced to run down and catch !.
Continued on Page Four) !