Cob: rat runs--cleanliness

[Priscilla Stuckey]

I'm a newbie to the list--Oakland, CA, homeowner, wanting to turn my 
half-ownership of a house into a whole house, and probably will 
actually be able to afford it if I build "dirt-cheap."

I have PLENTY of experience with rats here in this woodsy 
neighborhood--I've spent hundreds of hours and several hundred 
dollars rat-proofing my house--so I wanted to clarify something.

Rats show up, at least in urban & suburban areas, not because of lack 
of cleanliness, but because, like crows, they are opportunists and 
will go wherever there is food or shelter--that is, wherever there 
are humans. Here in the Oakland hills that means the basements of 
every hillside-clinging, expensive home. The only way to keep rats at 
bay is to seal every nook and cranny around your house (especially 
around pipes and wiring--the rat/mouse freeways) and then trap the 
ones that were indoors. BTW, rats are no less clean than squirrels. 
We just like squirrels better because they have fuzzy tails, and they 
weren't implicated in the plague. Rats have a bad rep because, since 
they are mammals, like us, and live close to us (closer than 
squirrels), diseases can pass more easily between the species.

I have a question, too, regarding rats & cob houses: I was really 
surprised to see the rat question come up on this list (you mean my 
rat-fighting days aren't blissfully in the past if I build a cob 
house?) because I thought that the solid construction would eliminate 
the problem. How do rats become a problem with a cob house?

Priscilla







At 8:38 AM +0000 4/29/03, Brent Flaco Wilson wrote:
>In a permanent culture where things have their place, and homes are 
>built intelligently into the landscape major varmint problems aren't 
>an issue.  But one animal that really keeps rats away is a hungry 
>housecat, and for that matter if you live by the river, grow a 
>forest for hawks, owls, and eagles, then have coyotes roam thru, and 
>your house dog, ok, thats how rats are kept at bay where I grew up 
>plus the kleen house and the raised foundation.  SO I think lets 
>keep parts of this totality in view as equal.  So I have also seen 
>cob homes in heavy forest with owl, coyote and other predators 
>keeping rats at bay, though the rats did crawl on the roof at night. 
>And once again a hungry cat protected their neighbors house.  So cob 
>off the ground with a proper ecosystem suited to the local area with 
>a domestic predator is pretty darn safe! flaco
>

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