When National Geo­graphic (NG) Chan­nel films a pro­gram on the habits of native species you know it’s big. Rat Genius aired in 2006, videoed in none other than the Dis­trict of Colum­bia doc­u­ment­ing our super­nu­mer­ary rat life. While rats are found on every con­ti­nent and thrive in every cli­mate, Rat Genius esti­mated there were as many rats in D.C. as Dis­trict res­i­dents. While the pro­gram advo­cates the crit­i­cal need that humans must change their behav­ior, the pro­gram alone has made lit­tle impact on Dis­trict behav­ior to date.

The Dis­trict Depart­ment of Health Rodent and Vec­tor Con­trol has begun a new city wide cam­paign of Pub­lic Ser­vice Announce­ments added to their ongo­ing edu­ca­tion pro­gram to empha­size how essen­tial indi­vid­ual behav­ior changes are begin­ning in the home, at work, and even how/ where peo­ple dis­pose of food con­tain­ers in pub­lic places.

The more inter­ac­tion rats have with humans—and its been thou­sands of years– the more they know us and have ‘back up’ plans and alter­nate strate­gies, accord­ing to Rat Genius. That means that the best way to fend off rat pro­lif­er­a­tion is to min­i­mize garbage and over­grown habi­tat. Always tightly cover your garbage, take garbage out­doors for pickup as late as pos­si­ble, reduce lush and low ground cov­ers where rats bur­row, prop­a­gate, and hide.

For those liv­ing in apart­ment com­plexes, note that trash should be wrapped and tied when thrown down chutes to help man­age­ment keep their trash areas clean while await­ing trash removal.

Out­door pub­lic areas where peo­ple gather to eat may also attract a late night seat­ing. Indu­bitably, food remains by design such as feed­ing the pigeons, in the worst case by care­less­ness and neg­li­gence, but even trash recep­ta­cles offer unstressed ban­quet­ing for our furry sub­ter­ranean neighbors.

Rats are incred­i­bly smart. They mem­o­rize and think. They com­mu­ni­cate with each other and are always adapt­ing to human behav­ior. They are phys­i­cally strong, incred­i­bly flex­i­ble and can squeeze through tiny gaps. They have high endurance and quickly prop­a­gate. Edu­ca­tion lead­ing to behav­ior mod­i­fi­ca­tion is the only way to reduce the rat pop­u­la­tion here that has no preda­tors but an unend­ing food sup­ply. —FBN

Rat Facts:

TEN TIPS to Min­i­mize RODENT ACTIVITY in this Weeks FBN»