"Their eyes are lit up like the headlights of a car. They are like vampires because they only come out at night."
|||Cape Town -
Giant rats that attack in packs at night are terrorising residents.
Lundi Galanda, 47, of Dura Hostel in Langa, said residents heard rats scratching the front door at night: “Their eyes are lit up like the headlights of a car. They are like vampires because they only come out at night. They have eaten their way through the metal door… there is nothing they won’t get through.”
Galanda said the rats had nibbled their way through peanut butter lids and Tupperware.
Galanda shares the hostel with seven other families, and many of the residents are toddlers. The hostel is divided into eight small cubicles which are crammed with furniture, mostly a single bed, stove, pots and clothes.
Community leader and pensioner Eunice Phathiwe, 65, who has lived in the hostel for 40 years, said it formerly housed migrant workers.
She said: “The rat problem has got worse over the years and they are not scared of us. They attack around 8pm. When we sleep we cover ourselves with blankets, even in summer.
“Now and again there is a horrible stink and we will find a dead rat under the bed or cardboard. This place is so crowded that some people sleep on the floor, which makes them easy targets. They bite us in the face, head and feet… wherever they find exposed flesh,” said Phathiwe. “They know what they want and where they are going… they walk with a purpose like humans.”
When the Cape Argus visited the hostel, a decomposing rat lay on top of a wheelie bin.
Phathiwe added: “We can’t live like this; soon these rats will make us sick. The government has to intervene.”
Phathiwe’s plea comes after the city’s mayoral committee member for health, Lungiswa James, announced last week that the department had budgeted R530 843 for rat poisons.
This followed a tweet from Premier Helen Zille who told her Twitter followers that she had been bitten on the toe by a rat in the garden of her Leeuwenhof home.
James said food waste attracted rats and that in areas with high rat populations, it had been found that some residents dumped their rubbish next to collection bins rather than inside them, or left their rubbish out on days other than collection day.
Eileen Slabber, managing director at Ecofirst Pest Prevention and Hygiene said the rat problem was likely to spread to the inner city in winter: “During winter, when it is cold and wet, rats prefer warm houses and factories because the food source is less outside and it is easier for them to find food and water indoors.”
She said the most common rats found in the city were the Norway drain rat and roof rat.
“The Norway rat prefers meat and the roof rat prefers vegetables and fruit; however, both are omnivores. They always go where they can find food or meat, such as food factories, in roofs and cavity walls and even in cold rooms – rats can adapt to very cold conditions.”
Tips to avoid rat infestation
Eileen Slabber’s tips for preventing rat infestations:
* Remove all refuse and thoroughly clean refuse areas on a regular basis.
* Ensure that all refuse bins, toilets and drains are covered when not in use.
* Products need to be kept away from walls and off floors.
* Ensure that all doors to areas where food is prepared are kept closed.
* Immediately isolate a room suspected of an infestation.
nontando.mposo@inl.co.za
Cape Argus