The rat was always very close to man. Since the dawn of time, he
walks in his path and learn to live in his shadow. This very complex
relationship evolve somewhat over time.
Mouse extermination : The plague
First
there was the episode of the plague pandemics with three spectacular
(the first of 540 to 665 approx. And the second from 1347 to 1771, the
last in the second half of the nineteenth century, China and India) .
Fleas carry the bacteria Yersinia pestis landed on this continent,
traveling the back of rats. When the host dies, they found another rat
or human.
Thus, during the second pandemic passed away a
third of Europe's population, 25 million people. Few people know that
rats do not transmit the plague just for spite. Instead, they are,
chronologically, the first victims. The only "wrong" was to travel as
stowaways on ships, and thus have been instrumental in the spread of the
disease.
Among the remedies against the plague,
Michael W. Dols (The Black Death in the Middle East) said: "That a
devout Muslim repeats the" subjugation "over 2142 times the sick and
plague go away. Some held the divine name" the believer "the best
medicine in the plague epidemics. We had to repeat it 136 times a day,
and even 299 times if necessary."
For the record,
blacksmiths seemed strangely preserved from the plague. Were they
protected by the underworld itself? It is believed that some minds. In
fact there is no mystery about it, if it is known that rats have a
horror of noise. These carriers of plague so carefully avoided the forge
and not contaminating no one who worked there. However, by coming into
contact with people infected, the blacksmith ended too consumed by the
plague.
Mouse extermination : How to get rid
In his book, Manon
Tremblay discusses various means used centuries ago to get rid of rats.
Here are a few, which are often of superstition:
rats coat of glue and feathers and set them on fire
introduce
garlic into the rectum of the rat, sew, and let him return to his
family. The rat was then supposed to tell his troubles to his friends
and discourage them from approaching the men.
planted in the
fields to protect a sign with the magic formula: "I beg you all, rats
are evil, do me no harm. I forbid you to this field, and if after my
defense, I never found you I certify that the mother of the gods I will
cut into seven pieces! "
place a barrel of beer where there were
rats and float on beer a lot of corks. The rats are expected to take the
caps for a cap stable and go there. Caps give way under their feet, and
they can no longer get out of the barrel. Drunk under the influence of
alcohol, they drown.
the first Sunday of Lent, sprinkle three
corners of your attic with holy water. The rats are then supposed to
escape through the fourth corner.
adopt an albino rat. Seeing the wild rats take him for a ghost and abandonment.
Mouse extermination : Superstitions
Some
read their future in the horoscope section of the Morning. Our
ancestors, themselves, watching the rats to guess their fate:
if the rats gnaw the furniture in your home, especially in the bedroom, someone in your family will soon die.
if your rats leave a house without being driven, it will collapse.
if the rats leave the ship, is that it will sink.
rats on a new ship is a sign of luck.
rats entering a house for no apparent reason are again harbingers of death.
a child who throws a rat tooth that has lost in him by asking for a new, more beautiful and strong, has a nice teeth.
According
to Barbara Hodgson (see his book), to get rid of rats "You can, for
example, read the Gospel according to St. John in three corners of a
house: the rats escape through the fourth. Wisely chosen, the fourth
corner can even direct them to the house of a neighbor too rich you
despise. "
Finally, if there is no rat is a good sign, unless it's
a bad sign. And if there are rats, is a bad sign, unless it is a good
sign ...
Mouse extermination : Domestication
During the nineteenth
century, Europeans have invented a game, which was to bet on the time it
would take a dog to kill rats, the rat baiting. Billy, a particularly
clever dog, is remembered for having succeeded in 1823 to kill 100 rats
in 5 minutes.
The rats were sent to the butcher caught
in the wild, but we soon had the idea to breed in captivity. Thus began
the domestication of the rat. Over the time of selection, the rats eaten
by the dogs we have become cushy pet.
Mouse extermination : Our grandparents
Do
you have noticed that the elderly are generally more resistant to our
love for rats? I find it rather normal. In rural areas, while farmers
worked the land hard, I can understand their desperation when a group of
rats was attacking crops.
For a grain eaten a rat defiles ten. Imagine the mess ...
Mouse extermination : The sewer rats
The
sewer rat to man makes an outstanding job. Crossing the line in
s'aménageant shelter, recovering which will serve as food or nest, it
avoids the congestion of pipes and is involved in maintaining our sewer!
Rats
of Paris, for example, eat 800 tons of garbage a day. Well worth a
curse, in the end ... It is said that this city has 2-4 sewer rats by
residents. The figure is vague, but you can imagine that a census in
good standing is complex.
Mouse extermination : The extermination
All
men do not hate rats. Instead, the animal fascinated by its incredible
versatility, and all the many services it makes us everyday (clearing
drains, experimentation, etc.)..
Still, the rat hunt
continues. And for that we must cheat. If a rat eats poison and dies
quickly, its affiliates will be the relationship between food and death,
and they were careful not to touch the poison. Death should take some
time. Vendors rat poison pearl a sweet sensation of heat that takes hold
of the animal, the ratophiles a painful death.
