quokka

Sure? Better not look too close...
Rats are distributed all over the globe, with the sole exception of the northernmost arctic regions and Antarctica.

PalenQ

Washington DC has a rat problem too.

NYCFoodSnob

It was new to me.

In my 30+ years in NYC, I've never seen anything like this. On my way to Notre Dame, Pont Louis Philippe was covered with rats, scurrying from one side to the other. There were so many, you could barely see any street. From a distance, it looked like the surface of the street was moving. When I finally realized what I was seeing, I thought I was caught on a Paul Thomas Anderson film set, and he was shooting another version of Magnolia. Wild.

I feel sorry for grocery stores and food vendors. Those rats get everywhere. A serious health hazard.

Btw, rats don't scare me. We dissected them in high school biology class. Still, I'd prefer they not take over a favorite city.

xcountry

Something for Macron and Trump to discuss. I bet Trump’s rats are bigger.

quokka

I saw a dead rat in the street two minutes from my house yesterday. If they are stupid enough to let themselves be run over by cars, there must be a serious over-population.
This is an average quarter in a perfectly normal mid-size German city, by the way. No dump or dirthole.

They are everywhere.

NewbE

I bet the reason no one is mentioning London in this admittedly unscientific roundup is the rise of urban foxes there. Humans create imbalances in nature, and then complain about the consequences.

Nonconformist

Sometimes it's hard to get rid of them: https://www.atlasobscura.com/article...-massacre-1902

ribeirasacra

Hunting of rats on a TV programme called Engrenages (Sprial). Wikipedia IMBd is much better than the hunting of rats on NICS or CSI.
If you have missed it you can find the back catalogue online.

LancasterLad

Worked in Paris for 4 years in the 1990s, and lived just outside in Le Vesinet.

Can't recall ever seeing a rat.....just lots of dog muck everywhere...

https://www.frenchasyoulikeit.com/ex...dogs-in-paris/

Yukkie.

fourfortravel

Vienna has rats, too. In fact, there is even a "Rat"haus for them.

My teen daughter and I spent a week in NYC in a not-too-distant February, along with her Slovenian BFF (first time to the US). BFF was "thrilled" to see a rat while we were waiting for a subway; it was something she could check off her NYC list. Not kidding.

kerouac

I have seen very few rats over the years and almost always only if I am out past 1 a.m. which is rather rare for me these days. However, a friend of mine did report seeing one of those rat swarms next to the Tour Saint Jacques last summer.

Pepper_von_snoot

I don't know if any of you geezers have read Elizabeth Kolbert's Pulitzer Prize winning book The Sixth Extinction, but in it one of the world's top scientists is quoted as saying that when man dies off rats will take over the world.

So, start thinking of Planet of the Rats, not Planet of the Apes.

Anybody remember the films Willard and Ben??

Thin

travelgourmet

https://www.theglobeandmail.com/news...ticle27504057/

For all intents and purposes, Alberta is rat-free.

marvelousmouse

I’m pretty sure there are Alberta rats that are laughing in a bar somewhere. They’ve no doubt evolved and become better at hiding, ala the fantastic mr. Fox.

I’ve seen rats in the NYC subway. They’re usually out of sight, though. If I saw a swarm in Paris, I’d probably run screaming. Roommate in college had pet rats. I don’t even like them domesticated and bathed.

NYCFoodSnob

Looks like the River Seine is up to its bridges, breaking a few burst records. This BBC article mentions that the water is flooding rat nests. I guess that explains the swarms running for their lives.

In pictures: River Seine bursts banks in Paris - BBC News

allisonm

A couple of years ago DH and I were exiting a subway in NYC when some lady started pointing at DH’s foot. There was a small rodent clinging to the cuff of his jeans. At the time I assumed it was a mouse, which was bad enough. But now, I am thinking it could have been a baby rat, which somehow just seems so much worse...

crefloors

The first thing I thought of was Ratatouille when I was this thread. LOL Thankfully, my friend and I didn't see any when we were in Paris in October. Rats are every where and they are survivors. All you can do is beat them back as best you can.
It's not just cities either. My brother lives out in the countryside and stopped feeding the birds when he watched the rat parade to the feeder one evening. As stated, they are everywhere.

travelgourmet

If they are hiding so well that they aren’t seen, I think we can all agree that Alberta does a better job than Paris.

And that is the point: Paris has a rat problem. By many accounts, it is a quite significant one. Authorities can either hide behind “every city has rats” (which probably isn’t true) or they can look to how Calgary and Edmonton attack the problem. I know which I’d choose.

xcountry

Things I learned on Fodors:

Slow down!
JET LAG Jet Lag jet lag zzzzzzz ... don’t drive.
Rats are everywhere - shrug.

kerouac

The biggest problem that Paris has is that as the most visited city in the world and people will jump on any excuse to trash it in the media, while often ignoring that the problem in the own place of residence is just as bad or worse.

How many times have we read "is it safe to go to Paris?" from people living in cities with ten or twenty times the crime rate.

Does Paris have rats? Yes, it does, just like everywhere else. Are they jumping into people's laps in the restaurants? Has anyone been bitten on the Eiffel Tower yet? Have any babies had their faces chewed off in their cribs? I've read about things like this in other places, but it never made a huge splash in the news.