Bangkok overrun by a million rats - lack of snakes and lazy cats to blame!

[radiochaser]

1 hour ago, sanemax said:

Bubonic plague was caused when they tried to kill all the rats and the fleas has nowhere to live (not on the rats), so the fleas moved to humans , causing the BP

A different theory was the killing off of cats based on superstition, led to the plague of rats, with the fleas that transferred the black death to people.  

 

[sanemax]

Just now, radiochaser said:

A different theory was the killing off of cats based on superstition, led to the plague of rats, with the fleas that transferred the black death to people.  

 

The fleas are happy and content living on rats , its when the rats die enmasse and the fleas have nowhere to live , that they migrate to humans and other animals

[smutcakes]

At least where i live around Phrom Pong/Thonglor over the past 5 or so year i would say i have noticed a reduction in rats. It used to be fairly common to see them running around but these days not so much. I do however live in a development with an abundance of cats so that might go some way to explaining it.

[Ban Phe Dezza]

3 hours ago, Happyman58 said:

Well, there be lots of farangs who have to go through this. You are right you can argue to you are blue in the face and everything you say goes in one ear and out the other. Has the lazy prick got a job? Thais mum still class their kids as kids still even at 34 years of age. Well, you are lucky like myself least I don't have her extended family move in with you like some farang have to put up with. Wife only has 2 brothers and you never see them.

Has the lazy prick got a job?  No 

 

[Happyman58]

26 minutes ago, Ban Phe Dezza said:

Has the lazy prick got a job?  No 

 

Well, He ain't Robinson Crusoe on that one in Thailand. Its ok I can I can open my mouth lots on this issue because I worked bloody hard as a coal miner for 40 years. Some of these lazy Thais would not last a week down in those pits So now I can relax and enjoy life. Saddens me when you see so many able-bodied men walking around doing nothing. When they are at this age they should be in their working prime life. But I was brought up in the old school maybe they are taught to be different these days.

[Happyman58]

3 minutes ago, Happyman58 said:

Well, He ain't Robinson Crusoe on that one in Thailand. Its ok I can I can open my mouth lots on this issue because I worked bloody hard as a coal miner for 40 years. Some of these lazy Thais would not last a week down in those pits So now I can relax and enjoy life. Saddens me when you see so many able-bodied men walking around doing nothing. When they are at this age they should be in their working prime life. But I was brought up in the old school maybe they are taught to be different these days.

oh well life goes on Have a great day

[Coastrider]

Lazy Thai cats are running from the million Thai dogs that are overrunning Bkk

55555

 

[ThaiFelix]

16 hours ago, Ban Phe Dezza said:

Sorry Duh Me no Comprehendo  as I felt my post was about rubbish 

I didnt quote your comment did I??    You misunderstand, I was referring to the original post.  I am actually agreeing with you.

[phil2407]

Rat burger anyone? 

Edited May 25, 2018 by phil2407

[The Deerhunter]

On 5/24/2018 at 10:22 AM, Get Real said:

I wonder how other countries manage to fix this problem?

Poison, traps,  pouring concrete down rat holes, collecting garbage,  prosecuting people who leave rubbish out anywhere.  Silly little things like that.  A million.  I doubt it.  By now it will be multiple millions of rats.  Bangkok (depending on where you draw the boundaries) is a really huge city with irregular patterns of rubbish collection, a million or more abandoned shophouses and other buildings, drains, canals and thousand upon thousands of hectares of overgrown wasteland  Go up on a toll way or BTS and look out in any direction some time. The unused swamp and wasteland space will stagger you, not to mention the huge number of abandoned buildings and impromptu rubbish dumps.   

If you want to know what Thailand could (should) look like, have a walk at night around Chiang Rai, preferably just after having a bit of a walk around Chiang Mai.  Count the rats.   Yes, C.R. does have overgrown sites and some abandoned buildings but the streets but at least they have a high proportion of footpaths you can walk on without turning an ankle, or even push a pram or wheelchair if you had to.   Take a walk around a couple of blocks near the night markets  and the Mercure & Duangtawan hotels in  Chiang Mai.  Just like being in much of Bangkok with rats and holes in impossible pavements. I could name other (relatively) well maintained towns in Thailand, but you get my drift.

Edited May 25, 2018 by The Deerhunter

[jak2002003]

4 hours ago, Jimdandy said:

As a kid growing up in New York City there were a few situations where people that were bitten developed rabies. They underwent painful injections and were cured but the thought of that happening is not good.I just hope the government agency responsible will be proactive. I stopped eating at many street venues.

Sorry, but you are misinformed.  There is no cure for rabies.  There is no way that those people that you say got bitten developed rabies and got cured by painful injections.

 

 

 

 

[Just Weird]

On ‎5‎/‎24‎/‎2018 at 9:23 AM, sungod said:

Everyone should have a Jack Russel.

Nowhere near enough meat on them to fill you up properly.

[Krataiboy]

Never mind Bangkok.  We could do with a Pied Piper in Cha Am, where countless rats have colonised the  piles of rocks and cement tipped along the six-kilometer Cha Am forshore to prevent sea erosion.

 

At sunset, I often park myself on some steps leading down to the town beach at sunset and watch the antics of rodent families which emerge from their hidey-holes to forage and have fun.  The rats come in all shapes and sizes and several different colors - black, brown and beige - and move like greased lightning.

 

Tourists wining and dining at the numerous al fresco restaurants which line the foreshore are either unaware of, or indifferent to, the potential health hazard posed by the disease-ridden vermin scampering around a few feet away - ready to pounce on any left-overs once the coast is clear. 

 

The area has more than its share of soil dogs, which appear as disinterested in the rodents as are the humans dining a few feet from their hidden lairs. My guess is that they are fed so many tid-bits by tourists that they have lost their appetite for rat meat!

Edited May 25, 2018 by Krataiboy

[captspectre]

a million rats? who counted? is that a state run job? how much does it pay? 

 

[Cake Monster]

Lazy Cats should really read " lazy Fat Cats " ( In the BMA )

 

 

[tryasimight]

On 5/24/2018 at 5:01 PM, Jeremia Juxtaposed said:

Yes , of course, food markets are only a recent addition to Bangkok............

 

Too much building and not enough parks means that when snakes are caught they are killed..(let's not bluff ourselves that they are "relocated") ... I voluntarily keep a feral cat that I have chopped the balls off and I involuntarily have a rat catching snake in my roof......I don't have rats...

Why did you chop  his balls off?..... And how??   what with?  Even vets don't do that.

 

Dreaming? 

Edited May 25, 2018 by tryasimight

[tryasimight]

On 5/24/2018 at 5:30 PM, Kerryd said:

That was tried in another place (I don't think it was in Thailand) a few years ago. They offered a bounty for every rat tail brought in but what happened was, people were just lopping the tails off the rats and letting them go, or actually breeding them to make even more so they could cut the tails off them as well !

Rats are survivors and, unfortunately, they are also prolific breeders. It would be almost impossible to rid a city of them once they have become "established". There are places (like Alberta, Canada) which are (supposedly) rat free (Alberta goes to great lengths to keep it that way as well as they know how devastating it could be on their agricultural industry if they ever had a rat infestation.)

But a city the size of Bangkok, located next to the ocean, with an already huge rat population ? Near impossible to get rid of them short of a 10 megaton nuke. Then you'd have to deal with the radioactive mutant cockroaches !

Where I'm at now (Nong Prue), the soi I'm on had 1 family with 2 cats. They'd catch the odd rat and for some reason liked to eat them behind my water tank on the corner of the patio. Also odd was the only thing they'd leave behind was the head. No feet. No tail. Just the chewed off head. Got them to stop by spraying copious amounts of tile/drain cleaner in the area and then hosing the spot down frequently. Got rid of the "dead rat" smell and it seems the cats don't like the "drain cleaner" smell so they take their meals somewhere else.

A little over a year ago another family moved in and the mother had 7 cats. One of them apparently won't eat anything but sewer rats ! Needless to say (perhaps), haven't seen or smelt a rat in our area for a long, long time. 

Bringing in scads of feral cats would have problems as well. Maybe not as many if they were all spayed/neutered but there'd still be problems. Cats are nature's cold blooded murderers and, like snakes and monitors, they don't differentiate between "pet" and "vermin". To a cat, if it moves (and is smaller than the cat), it's fair game.

So they would also help with the bird problem as well. As long as you don't mind all the cat crap (and hair balls) that would replace the rat droppings and bird "splat".

 

Agreed mate.... Nothing quite like opening the front door in rural Australia with a proud cat with a very pissed off 5 foot brown snake on the doorstep.  Cat almost purring.... Did I do good boss? 

No!!! 

[tryasimight]

On 5/24/2018 at 7:05 PM, 55Jay said:

Well, that bag of rubbish in the OP photo might have something to do with it.

 

The solution is obvious.  Round up several (hundred) thousand humanoids and shift THEM into the countryside.  Less rubbish in the city.  Fewer rats and possibly fewer snakes over time.  It's all connected.  Nature has a way of equalizing itself once humans stop meddling.  ?

 I didn't realise humanoids were that big of a problem.  Learn something every day. 

[55Jay]

2 minutes ago, tryasimight said:

 I didn't realise humanoids were that big of a problem.  Learn something every day. 

That's a good thing.

[tryasimight]

On 5/24/2018 at 7:37 PM, 55Jay said:

Indeed.  Weekly rubbish collection is hit and miss where I live.  In 2 days time, it'll be 2 weeks since they last came around.

 

Try to put the veg/fruit shavings and leftovers in the garden, not the bin.  Recycle everything that can be, the old boy comes around on his push bike to collect every few days.  But after nearly 2 weeks, the sois are looking grim as the house bins are overflowing.

We don't have a rubbish collection in the village.  And no rats to speak of either.

We also don't have much ' western rubbish either' . The plastic is burnt daily everything else has value and is recycled. 

I know people will be up in arms about burning plastic packaging but let's get real.... It is the ONLY non valued waste... EVERYTHING  else is recycled either in the garden or by the people who come by and buy any plastic bottles, metal cans,  paper or cardboard.  All up a pretty environmentally friendly result.... And as said before no rats. 

[tryasimight]

On 5/24/2018 at 7:54 PM, Jeremy50 said:

A million? How could the writers be so obtuse? Try 20 million, and probably a lot more than that. Even a small town would have several hundred thousand. 

And that is a bad thing? 

Imagine if there were no rats. The build up of bacteria through rotting waste would probably decimate the human population. 

What's wrong with rats? I've known some very, very sexy ladies who had rats as pets..... living on their bodies and running through their hair while I spoke to them.  

From a European perspective based on old wives tales rat are dirty disease spreading animals.  That is far from the truth.  They are doing is a favour cleaning up our filth.  No different to flies and their maggots or the dung beetle in the overall scheme of things.

Get over it... All cities have rats....and that's not a bad thing. 

[55Jay]

Just now, tryasimight said:

We don't have a rubbish collection in the village.  And no rats to speak of either.

We also don't have much ' western rubbish either' . The plastic is burnt daily everything else has value and is recycled. 

I know people will be up in arms about burning plastic packaging but let's get real.... It is the ONLY non valued waste... EVERYTHING  else is recycled either in the garden or by the people who come by and buy any plastic bottles, metal cans,  paper or cardboard.  All up a pretty environmentally friendly result.... And as said before no rats. 

Nice.  I lived out in a small village town first, for 4 years, same kind of recycling you describe, although we didn't burn as we had regular, Tessaban rubbish collection.

 

Had rat and mice problems a number of times.  It was due to the ever-present multiple, large sacks of rice purchased once a year from the local farmers, and stored in out buildings.  Snakes helped, local cats took their fair share, and I trapped a few times to keep it in check as well.

[lamyai3]

10 hours ago, tryasimight said:

I've known some very, very sexy ladies who had rats as pets..... living on their bodies and running through their hair while I spoke to them. 

Some? You mean you've known several people who do this? 

[lamyai3]

21 hours ago, Jimdandy said:

Yes, yes. That is why I said I do not think we will see it, but I wonder what could happen if someone is bitten by rats. As a kid growing up in New York City there were a few situations where people that were bitten developed rabies. They underwent painful injections and were cured but the thought of that happening is not good.I just hope the government agency responsible will be proactive. I stopped eating at many street venues.

Rat bite fever maybe, but not rabies. The reason they didn't die would have been they didn't catch rabies in the first place, rats very rarely carry it. Also, while it's true that rabies injections were once very painful, this is no longer the case. 

[bruceamstutz]

On 5/23/2018 at 6:10 PM, The Renegade said:

Up the minimum wage, that will sort it ?

No that's not at the heart of it....It's the because the cats don't want to come up against over runned soi's full of dogs.....      

[metisdead]

Off topic trolling posts have been removed as well as the off topic replies. 

[Cake Monster]

I read somewhere ( cant remember where and when ) that there was an estimated 10 Rats per 1 human on the Planet.

Go fgure

[InfinityandBeyond]

I think this was foreseeable since all the snakes and lazy cats were relocated to Government House on 22 May 2014. 

[micmichd]

On 5/24/2018 at 9:11 AM, stud858 said:

Let Norway or Germany come in and install the sewage services,  education system and garbage control. I'm not suggesting a complete take over of the country.  Just make a Thai City with Falang ownership. Kind of like whats happened in Australia and UK.

Germany? You must be joking. The place where I come from (Old Heidelberg) is full of rats, and the garbage is taken away once a week - in case the residents care to put the garbage bins out on the street.

Edited May 28, 2018 by micmichd

[micmichd]

Maybe gentrification drove the cats away. Cats love old houses as their habitat, and if you tear down their habitat then the cats will disappear.