Cityrats?More like suburb rats in CT as animals shift their habitats post-pandemic

Jul. 11—"We've been noticing a huge surge, a migratory surge, just in general towards residential populations, especially in West Hartford," said Neil Vayda, president of Simsbury-based Green Pest Control.

West Hartford has seen more rat infestations this summer in part due to a shift in the animal's habits due to the pandemic, exterminators say, with the intelligent pests shifting from restaurants and urban areas to home gardens and trash bins.

Rats have been adapting to human habitats for millennia and are quick to react to changing circumstances like the work-from-home trend, said Michael Sarnese, vice president of Richland Pest & Bee Control in West Hartford.

"I would say it's something that people should be aware of, and planning for it, because it's pretty par for the course," Sarnese said. "These guys just kind of attach themselves to us."

"Covid kind of changed the dynamic in which they operated," agreed Vayda. "They came to more residential properties and figured it out. They're following their noses."

Dumpsters serve as rat buffets

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Vayda said he currently spends much of his time in West Hartford and other suburbs, both at single-family homes and in large complexes with dumpsters, otherwise known as rat all-you-can-eat buffets.

At one apartment complex near Trout Brook, Vayda pointed to tiny tooth marks on the edge of a dumpster lid, clear evidence of rat activity. The rodents can gnaw through almost any material except metal, and dumpsters have plenty of plastic parts that allow for rats to chomp their way in.

Behind the dumpster was the proof — a baseball-sized hole in the ground with sloping sides and a couple of gnawed chicken bones on the side. Not far away was a smaller hole, one of the escape hatches rats build into every burrow in case of predators. A small mummified rat on the ground nearby testified to a serious infestation.

Vayda set to work, pouring bait pellets into a tube far into the reaches of the burrow. Professional pest control poisons allow for killing of the rats with minimal risk to pets or other wildlife, he said.

Once they find a good food source like a dumpster or garbage bin, rats begin digging a burrow for their offspring: A single female rat can produce nearly 80 babies a year in good conditions.

"When they start burrowing, that's when you know that they're trying to create a nesting site," Vayda said.

Rats' nests near dumpsters are an ongoing issue in West Hartford, but only this year have Vayda and other pest-control experts been getting frequent calls from owners of single-family homes. Several construction projects near Trout Brook and other waterways have also sent rats in search of quieter territory.

Homeowners who have lived in West Hartford for decades are seeing rats for the first time this year, or finding evidence of rats in chewed-through wood, gnawed garbage bins and holes in their lawns.

Rat's nests are often mistaken — perhaps wishfully — for groundhog, mole or squirrel burrows, but they can be quickly identified by pest experts by their sloping sides at the entrance and escape holes.

Homeowners often either misidentify or ignore signs of rat infestation until the animals pop up in garages, on porches or — rarely — inside homes. Rats don't transmit rabies and shy away from humans in most circumstances, although they can help spread diseases through the bugs that infest their fur.

What rats do bring with them in bulk is centuries of stigma and historical links with once-fatal diseases like the bubonic plague.

"A lot of pests represent filth; it's kind of the same with roaches," Vayda said. "So who wants to be the filthy person?"

That stigma plays right into the rodents' expansion plans — residents are ashamed to admit rat infestations to their neighbors, allowing the animals to spread from house to house.

"All of a sudden it becomes a very big problem for multiple houses around the area by the time it starts getting dealt with," Vayda said.

Rat infestation stirs shame

As a sign of how serious the stigma around rats can be, one West Hartford resident not only asked for anonymity but spoke to a reporter from a phone in a room with the doors closed — they didn't want family members to know about the infestation in their home.

"One evening, I was coming home... started to put my car in the garage and I saw a little rat running across the back," the resident said. "The second time there were two of them. And I said, 'Okay, that's it. I have to do something.'"

That sighting in March led to the discovery of burrows and rat holes on the resident's property, and launched an expensive and time-consuming effort to end the infestation. The resident, who hired Green Pest Control, appreciated the company's explanation of rat behavior.

Rats don't like new things and take time to approach traps like bait boxes, the resident came to understand, helping them adjust to the months it took to deal with the problem.

Hearing of widespread rat problems in the neighborhood, the resident said they plan to confront the stigma around infestation and take action.

"I haven't told my neighbors and I don't really see them," the resident said. "But I think that this is something I can mention to them."