Rats (Chicago, Madison, Sheridan: taxi, living in, move)

[coldwine]

Originally Posted by Lookout Kid

Rats outside? I can deal with that.

Rats in my apartment? Nope. I'd ****ing move out.

I've found it easy enough to get rid of rats. Or mice. They're smart enough to know where food isn't, and I'm smart enough to make sure that they don't find any.

God help you if your neighbors are slobs, though. And to be honest I've been convinced for years that I was the only person in Chicago who regularly cleaned her damn apartment.

[Lookout Kid]

Originally Posted by coldwine

I've found it easy enough to get rid of rats.

I've had a rat (or rats) turn a door frame into wood chips up to about an 18 inch height. That's a serious animal. I don't want that in my house ever AGAIN.

On this note, a friend of mine from suburban Milwaukee was playing with his kids today in my front courtyard, and found a dead rat half decomposed with that nasty little tail protruding from the furry rotted mess that was it's body. I was like, "Welcome to the city, kids!". But deep down I'm horrified that rats are so close to our building. And I sure as hell don't want my daughter finding one! "Hey Daddy, look what I found!" Yuck.

[coldwine]

Originally Posted by Lookout Kid

I've had a rat (or rats) turn a door fram into wood chips up to about an 18 inch height. That's a serious animal. I don't want that in my house ever AGAIN.

On this note, a friend of mine from suburban Milwaukee was playing with his kids today in my front courtyard, and found a dead rat half decomposed with that nasty little tail protruding from the furry rotted mess that was it's body. I was like, "Welcome to the city, kids!". But deep down I'm horrified that rats are so close to our building. And I sure as hell don't want my daughter finding one! "Hey Daddy, look what I found!" Yuck.

That made me laugh out loud, Lookout. Thank you. I want that on a t-shirt.

[Carantini]

what that whole story on a t shirt?

I saw a dead rat in the middle of ashland today.

[Drover]

I got to referee a rat fight on the subway platform the night before last. That was a hell of a way to cap off a very long and stressful day/evening.

[WhaThe]

I've managed to seal them out of my place. For now. It takes a little work finding all the entry points. The droppings and wood chips from gnawing holes is how I find them.

I was amazed at how easily they went through a 2x4.

[prinsessa]

I don't see many rats in the subway anymore but that is probably because I rarely take the subway. I was throwing some stuff away at my dad's house one day and heard something moving around in the garbage can (in the alley). I thought it must have been a squirrel since you don't normally see rats at noon. He poked his head out and I thought "man...that is one ugly squirrel!" After the whole body came out I realized it was a rat. Scared the cr@p out of me since I was only 3-4 feet away and I had opened that garbage can 5 mins earlier to throw something in.

[WhaThe]

I talked to an exterminator a few months back. He said whenever you see them in the daytime you know you have a baaad problem. Rats are nocturnal and are out in the daytime when there are just too many.

[latikeriii]

When my parents lived off of Augusta and Western in the early 70s, the rat problem was so bad that my dad saw a group of rats jumping in a sychronized manner to knock over a trash can and did after a few minutes. The trashcan had to weigh at least 50 lbs. He's still freaked out over that 40 years later, lol! I know that the old loop movie theaters(United Artists, Woods,etc) had severe rat problems too, those theaters were so gross back in the 80s(and before I'm sure). They were all torn down by 89. I live in NYC now and seeing rats here are like seeing cabs!

[coldwine]

I've always wondered "why" with respect to rats. Chicago's arctic winters should kill the bastards, but they just stay alive somehow. One would think that one, just one, particularly meticulous winter season of maintenance and disposal would ensure decreases in the rat population.