Bit by a rat? Bit by a damned RAT?

[TreasonousBastard]

Whilst taking out the garbage, which around here involves buying special yellow town bags, filling them and hauling them to the town dump, I noticed a heavily breathing brownish hairball in the milk crate/filing thingie on the back porch I threw some scraps into the night before.

Turns out it's a rat who, while heading for the bag of tasty potato peels or squash leavings in there, got caught in one of the round holes in the side of the crate. Seems his head and shoulders made it, but his fat ass couldn't get through.

Now, I have no great affection for rats, even though this was a cute country rat and not one of the fearsome Norway rats found in NYC subways and tenements. Should this rat have met its fate at the claws of one of the local barn owls, I would not have flinched or shed a tear. But, accidentally caught in this contrivance of which it had no natural knowledge did not seem a proper fate even for a rat.

So I freed it. Which meant cutting through the soft plastic while trying not to cut through the rat. Needless to say, the rat was not amused and kicked up a fuss. Having absolutely no appreciation for my attempt to free it to become owl food, it managed to bite the tip of my finger. A tiny bite, and a tiny bit of blood.

Being human myself, and not a rat, I continued freeing the ungrateful critter and managed to get it into a large plastic container. When I got to my vet's office and put the Tupperware on the counter there was the expected amusement. I think they were disappointed it wasn't a new patient.

But, they assured me there are no known cases of anyone getting a disease from a rat bite in these parts. The rat is now somewhere in the woods looking for its usual food, or looking out for an owl.

[antiquie]

1. Can't help myself.

[cliffordu]

2. Fuck. I thought I had a bad night

all I got was a post hidden over in META.

[LiberalEsto]

3. They still need to analyze the rat's brain to make sure it doesn't have rabies

Because any warm-blooded mammal can have it and spread it.

I got bit by a wild mouse when I was 12, and the state or county health department had to make certain it wasn't a rabies carrier. Good thing I caught it. Otherwise I would have faced those painful abdominal injections, just in case. Rabies isn't something to mess with.

[TreasonousBastard]

4. Thought about that, but small rodents have never been rabies carriers in the US...

and big ones, like beavers, only rarely. Anyway, doctors and vets don't worry about it.

It seems that raccoons, the worst carriers, have been successfully inoculated and were never much of a problem out on the east end of the island anyway. (rabies, that is, raccoons have always been a pain in the ass around here)

http://www.news.cornell.edu/stories/Feb11/RaccoonRabies.html

[pscot]

11. Small rodents carry bubonic plague and hanta virus

not rabies, so there's nutthin to worry about.

[TreasonousBastard]

12. I doubt my rat has spent any time in Nevada or Yosemite where there were recent outbreaks..

of these.

I don't think there ever was a plague outbreak in New York in modern times, and apparently in all of history there were two cases of hanta. Probably upstate, but possibly something traveling from the Southwest.

Anyway, various health professionals around here say not to worry.

(And if he had it, I could have gotten hanta from the rat pee in the area even if he didn't bite me.)

[Kali]

5. Androcles and the Lion was bullshit

about the only critter I have ever seen act close to grateful after being rescued from some bad situation is a dog. But they are obsequious by nature.

Try saving a bovine stuck in the mud. No fucking gratitude whatsoever. Dents in your truck is what you will get, I tell ya. Or an hooked horse if you do it that way.

[TreasonousBastard]

7. Have you have heard the more ancient, and more accurate...

fable about the scorpion and the frog?

[Kali]

9. oh yes

then there is my life. the scorpions and the toilet paper.

[femmocrat]

6. I was bitten by a mouse on my own sofa once.

The little critter was hiding in the crack feasting on potato chip crumbs! I lived to tell the tale.

It was kind of you to free the rat, nasty as it was to you.

[TreasonousBastard]

8. I wan't bitten then, but during one mouse invasion...

I found that they had been chewing through the the refrigerator cord. Maybe another week or two and it would have been fried mouse with a possible side of house fire.

And the greedy little buggers don't even bring their own beer!

[hibbing]

10. get well soon

Hi,
That was a nice thing to do to free the rat, it sounds like it was quite the entanglement. I hope your wound heals quickly.

Peace