OCR Text |
Show RATS TAKE POSSESSION OF SALT LAKE. Rats have invaded Salt Lake City large rat3 cf ravenous appetite. ap-petite. Alvin B. Smith and his brother, says a news item, have killed 430 rats in less than a month on their place near the city, and arc continuing the fight with prospects bright for another 430 dead rodents.. The strange thing Is not that rats are here now, but that the; had not invaded this intennountain country years ago.. There are countless millions of the rodents in San Francisco, a place in direct communication with Ogden, but so far the long-tailed pests have found no lodgement nearer than the city of washed-out railroads. Rats are destructive of property, a terror to housewives and a source of infection where certain diseases exist, such as plague. Before they become a permanent part of Utah's undesirables, a cam-paign cam-paign of extennination should be started. The rodents multiply rapidly, rap-idly, in fact, they increase in geometrical progression. Four years ago half a dozen field mice appeared in the western part of Nevada, and within three years they had increased to millions and had overrun and destroyed the alfalfa fields around Lovelock, Stillwater and other farming sections. To eradicate them, the goverment experts had to be called upon and a poison squad placed in the field to administer strychnine or arsenic to the invaders. Now, rats are as prolific as mice and, under favorable conditions one unmolested couple can establish colonics in every nook and hole within a few years. Allowed to multiply they will become a worse affliction than the English sparrow which, not many years ago, was introduced as a novelty in bird life, but which today is a destructive nuisance. |