The Actual Death of Rats

[akirlu]

Contrary to whatever you may have heard from Terry Pratchett, the Death of Rats is fluffy, green-eyed, unkempt, with black-and-mahogany guard hairs and a fuzzy, grayish undercoat. The Death of Rats lives with me.

Tinka was put out at being left home alone all weekend. She's been dubious about the cat tuna ever since we got home, and around midnight last night I opened the front door in response to plaintive kitty wails to find a glossy, medium-sized rat -- easily a third to half of Tinka's own mass -- laid out neatly on the welcome mat, its eyes still dewy and clear, like very fresh fish.

The good news, if you can call it that, is that Tink continues to be a good ratter. The less good news is that there are rats to be had. I really must have a chat with the rental office about more frequent garbage collection.

Comments

[shelleybear.livejournal.com]

I'm impressed.
Seriously, rats are VERY fast and can usually inflict heavy damage on whatever attacks them.

The Death of Glitter Balls

[ladyjestocost.livejournal.com]

I had somewhat the same homecoming - the plaintive meow, the offering - but since ActionJunky is an indoor cat, I rec'd a glitterball. I don't think it was the very favorite one, however. And I only got one. If I'm gone longer, I sometimes get two or three. Or I find a bunch lined up on my pillow.

Apropos of landlords and rentals, from something you said this weekend, I thought I might mention that a new development is going up in West Seattle, up the hill from where Fauntleroy crosses California. It's in the old Highpoint housing complex, but it's mixed income and some of the houses look very nice, at least from the outside.

[akirlu.livejournal.com]

Yeah, she's quite the prodigous murderer, is our little fluffball. This is nowhere near her first rat, and she also gets squirrels -- speaking of rodents who can usually inflict a lot of reciprocal damage. The largest prey she's brought us so far was a young woodland rabbit.

Tinka seems to have spent some amount of time living by her wits before she returned to housecat status, and clearly she used the time to polish her skills.

Re: The Death of Glitter Balls

[akirlu.livejournal.com]

I am adamant about Tinka's kills not coming in the house. One episode of waking up to find teeny, tiny feathers all over the bedroom, and the closet, and the dining room, and behind the couch, plus a headless bird corpse on the floor of my closet, was really quite enough. The thought of dead rats lined up on my pillow just doesn't appeal.

Thanks for the pointer to Hightpoint. That looks very interesting. Ordinarily I'm not very interested in new construction, but that seems to be hitting a lot of my buttons for reasons to buy new.

[shelleybear.livejournal.com]

supergee Once related the story of a cat he had many years ago.
Apparently Wizard was a superb hunter.
He would prowl the streets, alleys and backyards with the sole purpose of bringing home prey.
Arthur would meed him at the door and he (Wizard) would drop the dead animal at his feet.
Prompting Arthur to look at the cat and say:
"Wizard, a dead bird! You shouldn't have. You really shouldn't have!"

[mjlayman.livejournal.com]

When we got stationed at the Pentagon, Arlington County wouldn't hire my mother because she was a master teacher and she'd cost too much, so she worked sub whenever she wanted. On the days she was home, she would have chicken livers for lunch (because the rest of us didn't like them) and share them with Tiger. Tiger started bringing her the heads and livers of birds. I guess he thought he was contributing to lunch.

[don-fitch.livejournal.com]

Some caution may be in order. Upon receiving a rat complaint, your landlord may attack the problem by setting out rodent bait. As long as neighborhood cats and dogs just kill the sickly rodents there may be no problem. If they eat them, and the bait contained enough coumarin or certain other commonly-used poisons, there could be some sick or dead pets. Some rodent bait poisons don't move significantly up the food-chain (ipecac & similar vomifuges are fatal to rats but only annoying to animals that are capable of vomiting) and I suspect Seattle may have Regulations in place, but it still might be a good idea to keep a sharp eye on any local Exterminator activity.

[pecunium.livejournal.com]

We a member of the Church of the Sacred Rat Offering.

He figured the only parts we needed to have delivered were they head, tail, spine, ribs and lights.

So they would be left at the patio door, where I would be certain to find them when I went to water the plants.

TK

[akirlu.livejournal.com]

Good warnings all. I must admit, I don't so much want them to treat it as a rodent problem as a garbage problem. Ever since they switched to a new garbage company the dumpsters are too small, even when the complex isn't close to capacity, which these days it is. So every single week you have several days when the garbage is piled up or strewn around the dumpsters, and the crows get into it and strew it more broadly, leaving bones and crusts all over the place. The crew do a pretty good job policing that stuff up when they pick up the trash, but by then it's been lying around for several days. What we really need are bigger dumpsters, more dumpsters, or more frequent pickups.

So, say you wouldn't happen to know what LA radio stations were active in the early 1950s, would you? Or what typical radio programs would have been on Christmas Eve, circa 1952?

[akirlu.livejournal.com]

The atypical thing about Tinka's rat offering was that she brought it to the front door. More commonly, she leaves them at the patio door instead.