someone wrote:
"Rusty Hinge" wrote in message

Anything you put on a website (****ter, farceboo, even newsitems) will
show up if you feed the right words into a search engine.

No doubt you're right, Rusty, however there are a lot of rats about within a
2 mile radius of where I live.

There are lots round here too - half a dozen less now than last week -
but rats are only as numerous as the food-supply and predators permit.
(Predators to include humane beans and other hungry rats...)

They're around in my garden and in our
allotment. And everybody else's gardens and allotments. My neighbour keeps
chickens, so she knows about this as well.

They do like chickens. The trick is (with chickens) to feed them little
an often if you can - that way there's nothing left lying about for the
rats. Then of course, you have to put the roosts in a rat-proof place or
Little Red Hen becomes Little Dead Hen.

The answer is a decent air rifle and something the rat has to climb to
get at the bait.

But as I said, not a problem here at home as the cats deal with them.

I had a cat like that once. She discovered rats (I saw it, and it was
hilarious - her eyes were like saucers and if she'd had eyebrows...).
Trouble was, once she'd polished-off the couple under next-door's
summer-house, and those round a neighbour's hens, she used to go off for
a fortnight at a time Big Game Hunting...

We had the infant Ravensbourne running by, and that was just too good a
source of simply *DELICIOUS* rats

--
Rusty