The Brown Rat 223
take for granted the field Rat has a litter eight times a year; that she gives birth
to her first litter bf the year on January 1 ; that each litter is composed of thirteen
Rats, seven males and six females; that each female born within the year has a
litter when she is three months old, and subsequently a litter at the end of every
six weeks, by the end of December we find that one Rat will have been responsible
for the birth of the enormous total of 35,044 Rats, which number on the very
next day, namely, January 1 of the next year, by the writer’s method of calculating,
will have been increased enormously. What wonder the country is overrun with
the pests, though, to be sure, they do not increase at the above astounding rate.
I have frequently been present at the threshing of corn-ricks in the southern
counties, out of which 500 and sometimes more Rats have been driven and killed.
The ricks had seldom been standing for more than four months. Surely it is
time steps were taken to put a toll upon the field Rat in England. A penny per
tail might be the amount of the toll, and even that would be a mean price.’
In the East and South of England the plague of field Rats seems to be
becoming chronic. Not long ago a professional rat-catcher lived in every village, but
now, as he cannot wander at will with dogs and ferrets, the local rat-catcher is nearly
extinct, and the professionals, which are few and far between, are only called in
when houses are overrun to an unbearable extent. Nowadays Rats are not content
to wait till the corn is ripe or stored, but will even attack grain recently sown.
Thus we read:1 ‘ In some parts of Suffolk Rats have by their abundance become
a great nuisance this autumn. When shooting last week we passed through a
field lately sown with wheat which was completely overrun with the diggings of
some animal after the sown grain. The bailiff informed us this was done by Rats,
and on further examination it looked as if this was true. He also told us that
he and his men had destroyed 4,000 since harvest, and could hardly notice any
sign of diminution in the number, and that other farms adjoining were even
worse off, one having killed 6,000 since harvest a month ago.’
Rats are said to thrive most in a wet season, as water is very necessary to
theif well-being.
Recent demolitions in the Strand have aroused Londoners to the fact that
tens of thousands of Rats are living in the midst of London and daily creating
destruction to property. But it is a case of the heart not grieving at what the
eye does not see, for underground London seethes at night with a restless sea of
Rats which do some good by scavenging, but are constantly undermining and
1 W. R. Raillem, Field, January 9, 1904.