December, 1908.] 



561 



Live Stocki 



floors ; perforate the thatch, and destroy 

 everything else that is not actually iron 

 and stone. In addition the rat is most 

 likely an active agent in the spreading 

 of various diseases of domestic animals. 

 This is certainly the opinion of the ex- 



Eerts of the German Government who, 

 aving first proved beyond doubt that 

 rats disseminated trichinosis, found in 

 the course of a vigorously conducted rat 

 campaign that in all districts where 

 trichinosis had been stamped out — in 

 other words, where the rats had been 

 exterminated — there had also been 

 noticed a remarkable absence of cases of 

 swine fever. If we remember the foul 

 habits of the rat, its power to "get" 

 anywhere and live anywhere, and its 

 extraordinary vitality, we can well 

 understand why the rat should be an 

 ideal disease-carrier. The vicious role 

 played by the rat in the spreading of 

 bubonic plague has long been recognised, 

 and to-day the Indian Plague Committee 

 advocates the extermination of rats as 

 the first and foremost preventive 

 measure against the terrible scourge 

 that exacted last year in India alor*e a 

 toll of over one million human lives. 



What is precisely the cost of the 

 material damage done by the rat ? A 

 few years ago it would have been 

 thought as easy a task to count the 

 grains of sand on a stretch of seashore as 

 to answer this question ; but chiefly 

 owing to the general interest awakened 

 in this subject by the almost passionate 

 agitation of the Danish people for a Rat 

 Law, practical men and scientists in 

 every civilised country have given 

 lately their attention to the rat pro- 

 blem, with the result that we have now 

 passed from the vague " don't know and 

 don't care" phase into that definite 

 knowledge with a corresponding desire 

 for energetic action. There is to-day 

 not a single agriculturist who has not 

 either accepted or will accept, as a 

 reasonable estimate, the statement that 

 the rats of Great Britain and Ireland 

 cause a loss, by the destruction of food 

 and material, amounting at least to 

 £10,000,000 a year, and in the whole 

 of the British Empire at least to 

 £100,000,000. 



It is interesting to see how this 

 appalling figure is arrived at. To take 

 Great Britain and Ireland as an example. 

 All students of the problem are agreed 

 that there is not a hamlet or village, or 

 town, or city where the rat population 

 does not at least equal the number of 

 men, women and children. Beports 

 received from farmers, estate agents, 

 rat and sparrow clubs, and owners of 

 shops, hotels, restaurants, warehouses, 

 factories, docks and ships show not only 

 71 



that this is so, but, also that during 

 successive years there have been killed 

 as many rats as there were people living, 

 or employed, in the places reported upon. 

 This is to say, to take an average 

 instance, that the killing each year, of 

 from 600 to 1,000 rats in a village with 

 300 souls has apparently not appreciably 

 diminished the number of rats or the 

 damage done by them. If we further 

 remember that the total acreage of Great 

 Britain and Ireland in pastures, arable 

 laud, mountain land, woods and planta- 

 tions is over 56 millions, and if we only 

 assume one rat to each acre, we may feel 

 justified in accepting as a serious state- 

 ment the "minimum estimate" that 

 there are in Great Britain and Ireland 

 never less than 40,000,000 rats devouring 

 good food and destroying good material 

 with a voraciousness and destructiveness 

 that has made them a byword in the 

 whole civilised world. 



Until students of economic zoology 

 had agreed upon a minimum estimate of 

 the number of rats with those who 

 suffered actual loss, it was obviously 

 futile to attempt to calculate in £. s. d. 

 the loss caused by rats. At a meeting 

 recently held in London with the in- 

 tention of declaring war against the 

 rat, the Secretary of an important agri- 

 cultural society stated with much 

 emphasis but little show of reason that 

 "the rats cost the poultry farmer at least 

 one million pounds sterling per day." 

 Against this wild guess Professor Simp- 

 son gave it as his opinion that the 

 damage done by the rats amounts at 

 least to one penny per day per rat- His 

 estimate almost tallies with the infor- 

 mation received from the farmers and 

 others mentioned above who estimated 

 the loss to be about 20 per head of 

 the people employed, or living in the 

 place reported upon. 



It was Zuschalag, the author and now 

 Administrator-in-chief of the Danish 

 Rat Law, who brought about general 

 agreement upon this very important 

 point. He formulated what is known 

 as the "Minimum Loss Thesis, viz., 

 "That each rat causes each day, by the 

 destruction of food and material, a loss 

 amounting at least to a |d." Cage 

 experiments demonstrated the impossi- 

 bility of keeping alive two rats kept 

 in the same cage on a food allowance 

 of one half-penny a day for each rat, 

 no matter what kind of diet was chosen ; 

 the stronger would invariably devour 

 the weaker rat. As to this cost would 

 still have to be added the damage to 

 material, that the rats would have done 

 if they had not been confined in a cage, 

 the reasonableness of the " one farthing 



