Why Does Seattle Have A Rat Problem?

Believe it or not, there was once a time when you could not find rats in Seattle.  Of course back then, the city that we now call "Seattle" was not named yet.  In fact, it was not until Seattle was actually established as a port city that rats started showing up.  All of the ships that supplied goods and business and made the city thrive also brought us rats. Since then, the rodent population has been quietly getting growing and growing.

Nobody likes a rat.  They are unpleasant, disease ridden animals that infest our homes and businesses.  Yet, we do very little to stop them and many times we do things that just make it worse!  Back in 2010, the city of Seattle released its "Clean Alley" program where they replaced downtown alley dumpsters with new garbage bags.  The rodent population sure appreciated it and quickly started chewing through the new bags, bringing in all their friends.  This created a whole slew of rat problems for businesses and apartments downtown (as if it wasn't bad enough already).

This example would be an obvious reason for the spike in population, but there are plenty of more subtle examples that contribute to the growing problem we now face.  People leaving pet food outside or even a bird feeder in their backyard also draws rats.  When rats find a good food source, there reproduction increases as a result.  In the worst examples, rats will find their way into an attic or crawl space and contaminate the area causing thousands of dollars in repairs before a home owner even realizes that they are there. 

 

What Needs To Be Done

Warning, this is about to be a very self serving statement:  Pest control companies need to be involved.  What I mean is, if you see rats around your property, you should call a pest control company.  The products that you can purchase on your own are just not going to get the job done and professional treatments are needed.  People wait way too long to get rats treated by a professional pest control company and allow the problem to get out of hand.

If you notice rats roaming around a home that you are renting or your place of work, you should get the landlord or the business owner to call someone.  It is unhealthy to have this many rats living among us.

Again, this post is admittedly very self serving, but we do believe that rats pose a health risk and should not be ignored.  If you are dealing with rats, mice or any other rodents and needs some help, please give us a call.