How Alberta Eradicated Rats
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How Alberta Eradicated Rats
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Re: How Alberta Eradicated Rats
#2The Freakonomics podcast did a series on rats and their relationship to cities and humans and talked about Alberta's approach—it was really fascinating, I'd recommend it: https://freakonomics.com/podcast-tag/sympathy-for-the-rat
Re: How Alberta Eradicated Rats
#3Every so often I'll mention online that Alberta has no rats, and inevitably there will be an American responding in absolute disbelief saying I'm full of shit.
I may not live in Alberta, but luckily rats aren't really a thing in my neck of the woods. Travel an hour down the highway and it's a different story.
Also, as an aside, people often don't believe me when I say I've never seen a cockroach before in my life. Not a one. I've seen pictures of em, and I'm pretty sure if I saw one of those things irl I would absolutely shit myself.
Re: How Alberta Eradicated Rats
#4Every so often I'll mention online that Alberta has no rats, and inevitably there will be an American responding in absolute disbelief saying I'm full of shit. I may not live in Alberta, but luckily rats aren't really a thing in my neck of the woods. Travel an hour down the highway and it's a different story. Also, as an aside, people often don't believe me when I say I've never seen a cockroach before in my life. No…
Don’t receive shipments of goods from out of province then. Vermin get transported in packaging easily.
Re: How Alberta Eradicated Rats
#5One of the bonus features of the movie Ratatouille has a short video-game sequence about it: http://youtube.com/watch?v=-2xD9ShhMZU
Re: How Alberta Eradicated Rats
#6Every so often I'll mention online that Alberta has no rats, and inevitably there will be an American responding in absolute disbelief saying I'm full of shit. I may not live in Alberta, but luckily rats aren't really a thing in my neck of the woods. Travel an hour down the highway and it's a different story. Also, as an aside, people often don't believe me when I say I've never seen a cockroach before in my life. No…
Re: cockroaches, I haven't seen them until my mid 30s, when I started traveling to warm countries.
Re: How Alberta Eradicated Rats
#7Every so often I'll mention online that Alberta has no rats, and inevitably there will be an American responding in absolute disbelief saying I'm full of shit. I may not live in Alberta, but luckily rats aren't really a thing in my neck of the woods. Travel an hour down the highway and it's a different story. Also, as an aside, people often don't believe me when I say I've never seen a cockroach before in my life. No…
Don’t receive shipments of goods from out of province then. Vermin get transported in packaging easily.
Alberta of course has rats. Short of being a hermit nation with impassable borders, the alternative is impossible.
But they maintain such a critically low number through aggressive, non-stop actions that we declare it "rat free", though that's a misnomer. Similar to the measles free status doesn't actually mean measles free, but rather that it isn't spreading uncontrolled.
Though as someone who lives in Ontario, I just wanted to add that I've never seen a vermin rat in my life in this province. Not in Toronto or its subways, not on its streets, nor in various other cities throughout the province. I've seen mice, of course, but never rats. I know they exist here, but someone having not experienced them doesn't mean much.
Re: How Alberta Eradicated Rats
#8Earlier quoted context omitted.
Don’t receive shipments of goods from out of province then. Vermin get transported in packaging easily.
Alberta of course has rats. Short of being a hermit nation with impassable borders, the alternative is impossible. But they maintain such a critically low number through aggressive, non-stop actions that we declare it "rat free", though that's a misnomer. Similar to the measles free status doesn't actually mean measles free, but rather that it isn't spreading uncontrolled. Though as someone who lives in Ontario, I ju…
This bit made me laugh
But wild rats are rare. Albertans have grown so unaccustomed to rats that they frequently mistake squirrels, gophers, and other small animals for them: of the 875 reported sightings in 2025, only 47 turned out to be actual rats.
Re: How Alberta Eradicated Rats
#9Earlier quoted context omitted.
Don’t receive shipments of goods from out of province then. Vermin get transported in packaging easily.
Alberta of course has rats. Short of being a hermit nation with impassable borders, the alternative is impossible. But they maintain such a critically low number through aggressive, non-stop actions that we declare it "rat free", though that's a misnomer. Similar to the measles free status doesn't actually mean measles free, but rather that it isn't spreading uncontrolled. Though as someone who lives in Ontario, I ju…
I've seen plenty of rats in Toronto. I used to live around Chinatown and I could practically punt a rat just walking out my door at night.
Re: How Alberta Eradicated Rats
#10Earlier quoted context omitted.
Alberta of course has rats. Short of being a hermit nation with impassable borders, the alternative is impossible. But they maintain such a critically low number through aggressive, non-stop actions that we declare it "rat free", though that's a misnomer. Similar to the measles free status doesn't actually mean measles free, but rather that it isn't spreading uncontrolled. Though as someone who lives in Ontario, I ju…
I've seen plenty of rats in Toronto. I used to live around Chinatown and I could practically punt a rat just walking out my door at night.
I lived in Chinatown in Toronto (College and Spadina) and I saw a rat the size of a cat running around the inside of a Chinese supermarket around 2am when I was walking around at night during my university years. I also saw smaller rats and roaches running around Chinese restaurants as well.