Nobody wants rats in their home, but construction projects in developing neighborhoods can cause the rodents to flee into nearby houses. This is a common problem in developing neighborhoods, and this should not be surprising, as there exists billions of individual rats in the world. In fact, the country of China alone is home to an estimated two billion rats. In the state of Michigan, rats are currently fleeing a large area of land where an interstate is being constructed. As you can imagine, the many residents living nearby are afraid that rats will invade their homes in an effort to escape the construction site. This is why the mayor of one Michigan town has taken the initiative to have the rodents trapped before they gain access to neighborhoods. This project is costing taxpayers 125,000 dollars, but residents are not complaining.

Next week, interstate 696 will reopen in Macomb County, and the residents of Warren are prepared for the massive amount of rats that will inevitably make an effort to flee from the construction site and into their homes. According to Mayor Jim Fouts, without the rat trapping program, residents of Warren would already be sharing their homes with the rodents. In all there are 128 bait box trap locations and individual traps set up along the eastbound and westbound areas of the interstate. These traps were set up by a private contractor who specializes in trapping hordes of rats, and the box traps are checked every two weeks at a cost of 30 dollars for each check. This large-scale rat trapping program was initiated last April in order to contain the rats fleeing from the 90 million dollar interstate renovation project that covered I-696 from I-75 to I-94. The excavation of land and the noise produced by heavy machinery causes the established rat population to seek shelter, food and water from other areas, in this particular case, these areas happen to be people’s houses. The residents of Warren and other nearby cities are no strangers to rat infestations, as the city spent 275,000 dollars on a large-scale rat trapping program not too long ago.

Have you ever found a rat in your home?