Chuckjav Member Username: Chuckjav
Post Number: 1008 Registered: 09-2007
| Posted on Tuesday, October 28, 2008 - 6:51 am: | |
The Famous Fullerton-Foley Alley Rat Raids of 1970 - some of the largest rats I've ever seen. We would sneak up on the clusters of garbage cans; sticks & bricks in hand....tip over the cans - whammo ! Postscript: Fact is, nary a rat or child was harmed in the making of this remembrance; I am fairly certain we ran faster than the rats. |
Detroitrise Member Username: Detroitrise
Post Number: 3852 Registered: 09-2007
| Posted on Tuesday, October 28, 2008 - 6:53 am: | |
What's up with all of these subliminal threads? First it was wild chickens, now it's rats! |
Chuckjav Member Username: Chuckjav
Post Number: 1010 Registered: 09-2007
| Posted on Tuesday, October 28, 2008 - 7:05 am: | |
Detroitrise....well, rats do taste like chicken; so I am told. |
Bulletmagnet Member Username: Bulletmagnet
Post Number: 1661 Registered: 01-2007
| Posted on Tuesday, October 28, 2008 - 7:11 am: | |
I see a theme here. Now I know why it's called 'City Chicken". Anyone here ever try roof rat? |
Dannyv Member Username: Dannyv
Post Number: 447 Registered: 08-2007
| Posted on Tuesday, October 28, 2008 - 12:43 pm: | |
Pigeons are for racing, not for eating, the proud Buffalo said. |
Drjeff Member Username: Drjeff
Post Number: 37 Registered: 06-2007
| Posted on Tuesday, October 28, 2008 - 4:22 pm: | |
I've never actually seen a rat in Detroit. In Baltimore there are dozens in every alley. |
Cycledetroit Member Username: Cycledetroit
Post Number: 34 Registered: 09-2008
| Posted on Tuesday, October 28, 2008 - 4:27 pm: | |
"I've never actually seen a rat in Detroit. " come to Hamtramck. |
Raptor56 Member Username: Raptor56
Post Number: 566 Registered: 05-2007
| Posted on Tuesday, October 28, 2008 - 4:51 pm: | |
I always have to chuckle a little to myself every time I walk from the parking lot to the front door at the Olive Garden on Gratiot and 10. They have big ol rat boxes sitting out in plain sight along the side of the building. |
Dougw Member Username: Dougw
Post Number: 2192 Registered: 11-2003
| Posted on Tuesday, October 28, 2008 - 5:27 pm: | |
I've lived in Detroit 6 years and I have yet to see a rat either. I wonder if moving trash collection from the alley to the courville-based street pickup in the 80's reduced a lot of the rat problem. I've seen plenty of other things such as squirrels, pheasants, raccoons, and mounds of trash/debris, but I guess it's usually not food-based trash. |
Chuckjav Member Username: Chuckjav
Post Number: 1014 Registered: 09-2007
| Posted on Tuesday, October 28, 2008 - 6:19 pm: | |
Raptor56....Yes! Same thing, outside Famous Dave's in Roseville |
Chuckjav Member Username: Chuckjav
Post Number: 1015 Registered: 09-2007
| Posted on Tuesday, October 28, 2008 - 6:25 pm: | |
Dougw & Drjeff...you make a good point. Back in September, I was walking the same Fullerton-Foley alley way; I was all-the-way-up-in-it....vacant lots, vacant homes...chest-high weeds, woods & thicket. Not a single rat...(or human skeletal remains) |
Scs_scooter Member Username: Scs_scooter
Post Number: 112 Registered: 07-2006
| Posted on Tuesday, October 28, 2008 - 7:12 pm: | |
We've got rats in St Clair Shores. I have one of those big ugly bait boxes beside my garage. I've trapped, snapped and poisoned the little buggers but they won't stop multiplying. The neighbor behind me thinks it's nice to feed the birds! How many times do I have to tell him to knock it off because of the vermin? The rats showed up, bags in hand, when the I94 sound wall went in. The city even hired a company to try to get rid of them. Didn't work. You need cooperation from the whole neighborhood and it just doesn't happen around here. |
Eastsidedame Member Username: Eastsidedame
Post Number: 616 Registered: 12-2006
| Posted on Wednesday, October 29, 2008 - 3:23 am: | |
Roxanne says: "Time to bring in the reinforcements."
|
6nois Member Username: 6nois
Post Number: 741 Registered: 11-2006
| Posted on Wednesday, October 29, 2008 - 9:14 am: | |
I ran a rat over at 14 Mile and Coolidge Hwy. It came out of the storm drain just as I drove by and it was gone. I too have never seen a rat in the city. I've seen mice, but no rats. |
Pffft Member Username: Pffft
Post Number: 1782 Registered: 12-2003
| Posted on Wednesday, October 29, 2008 - 9:22 am: | |
Never seen a rat in Detroit? Come downtown. I saw one crossing Fort at Shelby at around dusk, he stayed in the crosswalk too. There are lots in the Joe Louis parking decks. I know a guy who bangs the door of his car in the company lot before getting in, to make sure there are none under his car. They lurk in the bushes around our lot. |
Gencinjay Member Username: Gencinjay
Post Number: 61 Registered: 03-2008
| Posted on Wednesday, October 29, 2008 - 10:01 am: | |
There are indeed rats downtown. I've seen many in the Fort and Shelby area also. The old Fed building used to be infested but then they closed up all the holes in the alley. The rats are still around but not as bad as they used to be. When I was a kid my dad owned a truck tire replacement business. He'd have to go to Wayne Soap all the time. I could never get out of the truck at night because of all the rats. They were HUGE. I never understood how they could make soap out of animal guts. |
Detroitchef Member Username: Detroitchef
Post Number: 20 Registered: 09-2008
| Posted on Thursday, October 30, 2008 - 8:16 am: | |
During the recent St Regis hotel remodeling, we had several rats in the basement who had names and lunches courtesy of the kitchen staff. One was, I swear to god, the size of a chihuaha. There was a sump well in the hotel basement and 'Bubba' could usually be found paddeling around down there, apparently just for fun. When we tried trapping them, they usually just laughed at us as they tore the traps to shreds. |
Greebomusic Member Username: Greebomusic
Post Number: 17 Registered: 08-2008
| Posted on Thursday, October 30, 2008 - 9:09 am: | |
Back when I'd hang out at the old Bookies Club 870 in the 80's, we use to go rat hunting in the apartments surrounding Palmer Park (many things "seem" like a good idea when intoxicated). I've also seen rats in the area surrounding Greektown recently. Face it, if there are people about, rats are about too. |
Docterry Member Username: Docterry
Post Number: 105 Registered: 08-2008
| Posted on Thursday, October 30, 2008 - 9:19 am: | |
I've not seen any rats in Corktown - opossums and mice, but no rats. My dad has some stories, though, like Gencinjay's, when he was a kid near city airport. |
Tkierpiec Member Username: Tkierpiec
Post Number: 139 Registered: 03-2007
| Posted on Thursday, October 30, 2008 - 9:42 am: | |
The rats that hang around the dumpster behind my loft are defiant as hell (and big).....they either stand there and look at me with no fear or stroll off slowly. As an aside - last week, I carelessly tossed a garbage bag through the side opening of that dumpster and it caught my key chain I was holding also. Arggghhhh! I had to climb in the dumpster to get my keys. Horrifying. |
Docterry Member Username: Docterry
Post Number: 106 Registered: 08-2008
| Posted on Thursday, October 30, 2008 - 10:20 am: | |
Tk - thanks for the laugh. Much less threatening, we had a mouse last winter that would sit on my daughter's bed and watch her yell at him/her to go away. She ended up with him/her in an aquarium for a week or so as a pet before he/she finally made off in the middle of the night. Scared the living daylights out of her at first, then she kind of got used to him/her. They don't come downstairs because of the cats. It was my "I told you so" moment of the month, as I've told them not to leave food up there. |
East_detroit Member Username: East_detroit
Post Number: 2235 Registered: 11-2003
| Posted on Thursday, October 30, 2008 - 10:55 am: | |
When they knocked down the Madison Theatre, we saw a bunch of cats running around at night on the pile of junk. Except that when we walked closer we realized they weren't cats. Hey, btw, whats on the menu at Angelina's? |
Partyhardy Member Username: Partyhardy
Post Number: 33 Registered: 09-2008
| Posted on Saturday, November 01, 2008 - 2:44 am: | |
SCS is definitely rat infested...all over the city. My sister has had problems with them and I've heard exterminators talking about how bad the problem was in the city. New York, on the other hand, is like no other. I remember crossing the street and seeing a dead rat laying there by the crosswalk (two separate times)...everyone else seemed not to notice, like it was common. I remember seeing cockroaches twice on the street, too...kinda like the cockroaches in the WSU Student Center. :-| |
Snoringbeagle Member Username: Snoringbeagle
Post Number: 50 Registered: 02-2008
| Posted on Saturday, November 01, 2008 - 7:00 am: | |
Lately when it comes to gas prices, the financial melt down and taxpayer funded bailouts a lot of people are smelling 'em. Rats that is! |
Dustin89 Member Username: Dustin89
Post Number: 266 Registered: 07-2006
| Posted on Saturday, November 01, 2008 - 10:22 pm: | |
Snoringbeagle, I think you may have my favorite handle of anyone on this forum. =) |