Cayman needs a Pied-piper

Barry Fitzgerald, a technician with Pest Kill

Debris and rotting garbage piling up provide an ideal
feeding and breeding ground for Cayman’s growing
rat population

Tuesday,  June 21, 2005

Reports are growing over the apparent increase in the rat population across Grand Cayman, in particular Seven Mile Beach and George Town areas. A number of Cayman’s pest control companies have indicated that this increase in rats occurred just after Hurricane Ivan and was due to the dumping of garbage around residences, condos and hotels. With so much debris still around a seemingly ever-increasing dump site and so much displacement of natural habitats, rodents are becoming a serious issue here.

Many local experts are convinced that because the post-Ivan clean up took sometime, it allowed a feeding frenzy for rats. One expert also indicated that when the dump was bulldozed and spread out this destroyed some of the rat’s homes and breading grounds, causing them to seek alternative places.

“When you can see rats out feeding during the daytime, there is definitely an increase in population,” a spokesperson for one of the pest control companies said. “There has been a defined increase of work orders for rat problems. Most residences, commercial businesses, and condo complexes, have continual contracts with pest control companies, which rid their property of rats, but, when neighbouring properties don’t do the same the problem reoccurs. Environmental Health Department certainly do their part in pest control but definitely need to step up their efforts”.

Kieran Hendricken, Manager of Pest Kill, supported the opinion that there was a serious increase of rats:

“It has gotten even worse over the last two or three months. The normal reproduction period for rats is 28 days, producing from 1 to 12 rats per litter,” said Mr Hendricken. “Another serious issue is, there is a huge increase of scorpions as well, and the number of reports and jobs has risen from 10 jobs per month to 150 jobs per month.

“I believe that since most of the vegetation was destroyed after Hurricane Ivan, the scorpions have lost their natural habitat and moved their nests into people’s attics and AC ventilation system etc., eventually falling through the vents into the houses. The only thing that is keeping a balance of the eco-system in relation to rats is their natural life cycle and pest control,” he added.

Roydell Carter, the Director of the Department of Environmental Health, commenting on the rat situation said his department had an ongoing Rodent Control Programme in place and there is a likelihood that there is an increase of rats in Cayman, primarily since Hurricane Ivan, due to flooding and displacement of their natural habitat.

“Department of Environmental Health is monitoring reports and complaints and is on top of things. We are concentrating on baiting entire areas rather than individual residences or businesses, as they continue to target high risk areas”.

Mr Carter added that he is encouraging to call and report on any such areas where they observe an increase in the presence of rats.

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