https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rats_in_New_York_City#Control
NYC has a rat for every 4 residents.
I seem to recall something about the London tube system having a few.
]]>I suspect that I may understand the significance of that, but may not and others from farther away probably won't.
Please explain about mini Atlantas, if you would.
]]>The actual city of Atlanta which has tall buildings and other urban features has just under 500K residents. Which is the same size as my city of Raleigh NC. The metropolitan area of Atlanta has 6 million people. And most of those people live in smaller cities and towns surrounding Atlanta. Mostly in single family housing or garden apartments. (2-3 stories). So Atlanta is very flat with a big spike in the center and a few smaller spikes scatter around. Most people in that area don't want to live in a big city so they've traded that fear off for having to drive in huge traffic jams to get anywhere but the local store. The few times I've had to drive "around" Atlanta in the last few decades I've tried to do it on weekends or late a night. Last time the timing didn't work out so even though we were on the loop 5 to 10 miles from the city center we were stuck in traffic for 2 or 3 hours going around the edge.
This has also created the fractured politics of the area as most people think and vote about THEIR local town instead of the area.
H can talk about the similarities to So Cal.
]]>There were endless plans to extend the MARTA light rail lines out into the suburbs east and west of Five Points. These plans were always knocked down because the suburbanites didn't want Those People riding the trains into Their Neighbourhoods and being Black in a White area. They were also pissy assholes who hated paying for their maids, nannies and groundskeepers to get a taxi back home to the city centre at night because there was no public transport.
]]>New owner had a crew in today. Stripped it down to the ground except for two trees & three bushes.
Since we're talking about Raleigh NC, there's a larger than normal thread here on Nextdoor about the dangers of hawks trying to swoop up small dogs. Started by someone whose dog was attacked and lost an eye. With a side note of how terrible it is that they eat the other small creatures. Some of us contrarians point out that the hawks are wired to go after small creatures in the open. And clearing lots creates open spaces for them to hunt.
The people getting the vapors outnumber us pragmatists about 5 to 1.
It doesn't really bother me when hawks get the baby bunnies. That's what nature does. Although I'd much rather see them eat squirrels.
It does make me a bit unhappy if people harm them. Makes me unhappy when people bother the hawks.
The work crew didn't do anything to the baby bunnies other than tear out all the plants that their nests were hidden in. And I guess they (the baby bunnies) either found new nesting sites or the hawks ate them, 'cause I didn't see them today when I walked past there.
]]>I think you're right about her biodiversity, but watch out for sampling bias. Years ago I read that the most biologically diverse area in the UK, by documentation, is in and around Oxford. This makes a lot of sense once you realize that Oxford has a lot of highly educated biologists who have spent centuries poking the bushes and writing letters to other biologists about what they found.
]]>So that might be sampling bias.
]]>The first time I ever had to drive around Atlanta was April 1976, in an Army M52 semi-tractor truck pulling a 33ft AN/ASM-189 Mobile Electronic Shop. We were in convoy from RDU airport to Ft. Rucker, AL and it was my shift behind the wheel when we arrived at the junction between I-85 and I-285. I was the co-driver in training, but the convoy commander was not going to stop for us to change drivers just because it was rush-hour on I-285, so I got my first taste of Atlanta driving behind the wheel of a "big rig".
I probably had more fun than some of the other drivers trying to get around I-285 that evening.
]]>I suspect they had/have learned when the trains stop for the night and come out then. fewer annoying people trying to kill them at that time. And their food sources tend to be unmanned then.
I read some stories about rats in the first year or so after 9/11 in downtown Manhattan. With all the people mostly gone from a large area (along with their food sources) they could be seen at times in waves headed down empty streets late at night. Haven't been able to source the story to find out if true.
]]>I suspect they had/have learned when the trains stop for the night and come out then. fewer annoying people trying to kill them at that time. And their food sources tend to be unmanned then.
I read some stories about rats in the first year or so after 9/11 in downtown Manhattan. With all the people mostly gone from a large area (along with their food sources) they could be seen at times in waves headed down empty streets late at night. Haven't been able to source the story to find out if true.
There were rats when we were building the Shearon Harris plant. I saw them on first & second shift. They didn't seem too fussed about people being around.
There were also feral cats out there hunting them.
We were using #18 rebar for the containment building (18/8ths = 2¼ in. diameter) and I was generally working 200-300 ft straight up. It was not unusual to have a rat come scurrying along one of the bars up there with a feral cat in hot pursuit.
]]>I worked with a guy who used to clean mussels out of seawater pipes that delivered cooling water to airconditioning units. It had to be done manually because they had tried putting poison in the system and the mussels had wised up to when the poison was being dosed. Initially by the time of day (these are in a pipe that's perpetually dark) and then when the humans started randomising the time, by some other means. He suspected they knew the sound of it being added, but who knows. (can mussels hear?)
]]>TL;DR modest effects, that will help. Doesn't really address how to maximize the lock-in of said behavioral changes. (Back-to-the-office pushes are obviously evil counter to such lock-ins.)
( via phys.org )
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