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possibly where rats swarm. Mr. Wilfrid Wheeler, secretary of 

 the Massachusetts State Board of Agriculture, had a cat which, 

 he says, caught about 2 rats a day for two weeks, but the rodents 

 were so plentiful that this cat's work made no apparent differ- 

 ence in their numbers and destructiveness, and it was found neces- 

 sary to resort to poison. Dr. George W. Field of Sharon has 

 found traps, poisons, terriers and other means necessary with 

 rats, even on a farm where ten to twelve cats were kept. 



The evidence of my hundreds of correspondents regarding the 

 value of the cat as a ratcatcher is varying and contradictory. 

 Many correspondents find their cats very useful in reducing the 

 numbers of rats in barns and outhouses, or in driving them from 

 dwellings and poultry houses. Many others find theirs abso- 

 lutely worthless for these purposes. On a farm where there were 

 several cats, the farmer was anxious to know about the best 

 rat traps, as the premises were overrun with rats, and they had 

 entered the bird cage and eaten the canary. A poultryman said 

 that rats swarmed all over the place, although there were so 

 many cats there that he could not give the exact number. A 

 miller asserted that cats were short-lived in his mill as the rats 

 were too much for them. Another had a cat that kept his mill 

 nearly free from rats and mice. There are many tales of cats 

 beaten, cornered and even killed by full-grown rats, and others 

 of cats that are believed to have killed large numbers of rats 

 with impunity, all of which goes to show that there is much dif- 

 ference in cats. 



In speaking of mice there is more agreement; although some 

 cats will not touch mice, the majority apparently catch them. 

 This has been the experience of mankind for centuries, but as 

 mice are easily caught by any one with energy enough to set 

 mouse traps, the principal advantage of the cat as a mouse trap 

 is that it is "easy to set." Any intelligent, observing, persist- 

 ent person can exterminate mice with traps, except perhaps in 

 granaries and like buildings where abundant food is accessible. 

 Cats, on the other hand, cannot exterminate them as they some- 

 times extirpate rabbits, for the reason that they cannot follow 

 mice into their holes, and they cannot, like traps, attract them 

 from their holes. Nevertheless, a good mouser often will make 

 life so unpleasant for mice, as well as rats, that they will leave a 

 dwelling house inhabited by such a cat and go where cats are 

 not kept. Such cats are valuable, if they can be confined to the 

 premises where rats and mice are troublesome. 



