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"The rat, the trap and the dilemma"

As the title suggests, there’s a bit of a dilemma going on at the moment.
You see, there’s been a nasty rat stalking the garden and the surrounding area, and as we all know, rats are vile communicable disease carrying vermin who will multiply quickly and take over the neighbourhood/world given the slightest chance. I’ve never seen the beast in question, but others have, and I think I’ve heard it having fights with cats during the night.
So, to counter this potentially large problem, my dad went out and bought a mouse/rat trap the other day, just one of those ordinary traps that we’ve seen so often in Tom & Jerry cartoons.
He brings the trap home, and to my astonishment, the “Extra Power Little Nipper Rat Trap” is probably THE most lethal device of torture and/or killing I’ve ever seen!!
You could trap a bloody elephant with it!
The spring can only be lifted and set by someone with Geoff Capes-esque strength, and when set off it can snap a pencil and probably an iron bar with the slightest of ease. This trap will not just stop/stun the vermin, it will definitely hurt, and more than likely behead it or completely obliterate it.
I started to wonder whether this might be a little too cruel, even for a nasty rat.

So aren’t there any safer, friendlier ways to trap the villainous vermin?
Well, my uncle had a problem with rat/mouse eating stuff in his loft a few months ago, so he bought a non-lethal trap (a kind of tube where you put food in one end, and when the pest goes in, the little door closes and traps it), he baited it, set it and waited. Some days later, he went back up into the loft and found that the so-called “non-lethal” trap had showered his loft in pieces of rodent debris. So much for the non-lethal option.

Ever since a Jack Russell dog chased me and a school pet Russian hamster had a grudge against me and bit me a few times many years ago, I’ve never liked animals. In fact, I hate all animals and believe that vets should be made to practice on human health and help us out with our ailments rather than worrying about cats with constipation or whether dogs have feelings of anxiety. Pets are pointless, dumb animals and only lead to large vets bills, scratched up arms and chairs, pooh in unexpected places, cleaning out hutches/cages in the freezing winter months and more unpleasant side effects.
Whilst many people love animals, rats are reviled evil pests, and I have no qualms about getting rid of the horrible things, but it does seem to me, the animal hater extraordinaire, that this is a highly cruel way of getting rid of it, and for all the hatred we have towards rats, it just doesn’t seem right to kill the little guy like this. I suppose it’s a bit like the fox problem; their numbers should be controlled, but not by toffee-nosed snobs on horses with hunting dogs and shotguns.

This little rat problem can have one of two outcomes:

1) The trap is set; the rat falls for the bait and is turned into rat paste (a bit like when Michael Ironside shoots the rat in Total Recall). Problem solved, but guilty feelings about overt cruelty remain. I look at the rats pained expression as it stares up at me as if to ask, “why?” I fall to my knees and go “NOOOOO!! What have I done!”

2) The trap is not set due to having weak will and not wanting to be overly cruel. This lack of ruthlessness leads to a major rise in the rat population in Essex and the South East, leading to diseases, plagues and much human suffering.
(Though having thought about it, a little plague to wipe out the majority of scummy Essex yokels wouldn’t be too bad…)


It’s more than likely that the trap will be set, and the rat will be destroyed, but I’ll always feel a little guilty at the suffering of that creature, even if it was a disease-carrying pest.

Doesn't matter really does it? If this traps as powerful as it seems, it will no doubt inflict an injury so fast and lethal, the then-half-rat will be dead before the signal reaches it's brain that something is hurting, no?

So, you are in a humanitarian crisis?

You get a non-lethal trap, the rat is caught, but you forget to check the trap. The poor rat stays confined in the trap until it starves to death.

Or

You use the pencil snapping touch of death, that will deliver a quick and painless, yet deadly blow to the rat.

Which is more humane?

I know, or knew, someone who had a pet rat. It's testicles were humungous (obviously compared to it's body size not compared to my superior size dollops of love). I think they had swelled, then it had to be put down because it got dead aggressive and started biting him. Probably the testicles went to his head.

Vast Luckystar wrote:
> I had a pet rat once. But it scuttled off when I wasn't looking. True
> story.

Did it go up a drain pipe?

You didn't grab it in anger and squeeze it until it exploded? Oh, you're not a sadist - my mistake.

I had a pet rat once. But it scuttled off when I wasn't looking. True story.

Not quite.

Not as sickening as watching a rat's head explode in your face, I'd be willing to bet.

We had problems with mice in our flat (being above to eateries didn't help) and they would come into our rooms at night and rustle around in anything that they could find. Usually they'd pick the object that would make the most noise, at two in the morning, like a carrier bag or a xylophone (ok comedy effect).

We tried every humane method to rid ourselves of them (trapping them in clothes bins, bags, tubs) and then letting them go, but it was to no avail. Then we got mean and layed out several glue traps. These traps hold the mouse in place so securely that the mouse will often rip limbs off in a bid to escape. Mice also make screaming noises in such circumstances.

Thus one of us in the flat had to put the mice out of their misery as soon as we found them. It fell to me and I had to take the poor creature, trap and all, place it over the step to the backdoor so their head was just on the overhang and hit it's neck with the back of the broom.

Sickening but a mercy (mousey) killing none the less.

No need to imagine - the vision is indelibly etched in my mind, maybe even my retina. When I die and they scan my retina to see the image of whoever killed me ('ve realised I won't die in my sleep) they'll (the "boffins" that is) be scratching their heads saying, "My God! This is the most horrendous sight I've ever had the misfortune to witness. Did this guy (Jack) with a look of abject horror on his face kill him?"

The blood and guts splattered across Jack's face, neck and limbs was the foulest thing I've ever beheld in my short life.