Urban Rats: Adaptability and Intelligence

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This chapter explores the living habits and nesting behaviors of urban rats, showcasing their remarkable adaptability in city environments. It highlights their use of resources for nesting, their complex social interactions, and their surprising intelligence, including tool use and advanced communication through vocalizations. The conversation also touches on cultural myths surrounding rats, humorous anecdotes, and interesting insights into their behavior and care as pets.

Let’s kick off Spooktober with… RATS: They love pizza. They invade taquerias at midnight. They scurry. They cuddle. They outsmart. They inspire movies that inspire musicals. Proving that not just woodsy megafauna can be charismatic, rats have lives we would never suspect. Globally-lauded Urban Rodentologist Dr. Robert Corrigan, or Bobby if you like, has been studying these animals in their big-city ecosystem for decades and he is a wonder-filled joy. Learn about rats’ origin story, the difference between a rat and a mouse, where they live, their preferred “food dialects,” and how to (hopefully humanely) keep one out of your house -- or car? Might as well start to love and respect them, because we’re not-too-distantly related and one day… they may be steering the ship.

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A donation went to the Yash Gandhi Foundation