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The COVID-19 It has changed many of our habits, it has reconfigured the lifestyle of entire cities, but it has also done so for non-human species: like rats.
These, dependent on leftover restaurant food, for example, are suddenly experiencing shortages; a scarcity that pushes them to drastic solutions that involve bloody battles between rats, cannibalism and infanticide.
Resources
Rats whose food sources have disappeared will not only move to other colonies and come into conflict with other rats over scarce resources, but They will eat each other to survive, including the offspring.
Residents of dense urban areas and some rural areas of the United States have lived with these vermin, but sightings in some cities have increased in recent weeks due to the pandemic.
In New Orleans, where Louisiana's governor imposed a stay-at-home order that forced many restaurants to close, particularly those in popular tourist areas like the French Quarter, a viral video published in March showed scores of rats taking to the streets to look for food. And officials say social distancing is to blame.
In fact, Claudia Riegel, director of the New Orleans Mosquito, Termite and Rodent Control Board, declared in it The Times-Picayune that the city is preparing aggressive pest control measures.
Washington DC is also taking steps to combat rodent problems. The mayor Muriel Bowser closed restaurants and other businesses but designated pest control workers as essential. Before the pandemic, the city had already aggressively implemented pest control measures, including the use of feral cats.
In the last 30 days, the city has received almost 500 calls related to rodents, according to 311 data (The 311 emergency number is used to report incidents where immediate police presence is not required). In nearby Baltimore, which has a robust rat eradication program, city data shows there were about 11,000 'proactive' calls or online 311 requests about rats in the same period.
Rats have a great ability to reproduce. From 2 months of age they can reproduce. They can reproduce up to 13 times a year and have up to 14 rats per litter. The female rat is capable of preserving the male's semen in her body to self-fertilize again once she gives birth to the litter. Maybe this pandemic will end up reducing their numbers for the first time in a long time.
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The news
War, cannibalism and infanticide: the solutions that rats find to survive in the COVID-19 era
was originally published in
Xataka Science
by
Sergio Parra
.