Climate change could impact Alberta’s rat population: expert

Darcie Deangelo, an anthropologist with the U of A joined CTV Morning Live Edmonton to discuss her new book on human and rat relations.

For 75 years, Alberta has boasted the absence of rats. The control program has been around since 1950, when rats were declared a pest and an agricultural threat. Darcie Deangelo, an anthropologist with the U of A, joined CTV Morning Live’s Kent Morrison to discuss her new book on human and rat relations.

This transcript has been edited for length and clarity.

Kent Morrison: I know you’re looking at interprovincial relations when it comes to rats right now. What do you think of Alberta’s approach?

Darcie Deangelo: Alberta’s approach has been really effective. There are no rats or no residential rat populations in Alberta. Partly, that’s due to the fact that we saw them coming in the 1940s and were able to prevent them from crossing the border with an official legal status of pest species and also making sure that we set up the Alberta rat control program.

Kent: How does B.C.’s rat control program work with Alberta?

Darcie: Alberta and B.C. have very different needs. In British Columbia, there’s plenty of rats and they’re all residential. There’s two main species, the black rat and the Norway rat. Because B.C. is on the coast, they have a lot of them coming in from the coast. While they’re an invasive species, they’re already residential in B.C., so they have new programs to see how you can cohabitate or find evidence-based practices to manage the rats. Whereas in Alberta, the goal is to make sure they stay out because there are no residential rats. It’s a completely different set of needs. You need to make sure that people are aware of what rats look like, that they report rats when they see them, and that there’s a different kind of science communication when it comes to rodent management.

Kent: Climate change is impacting a lot of different things. Is this going to impact rats and their migration as well?

Darcie: Yes, unfortunately. Climate change is increasing all pest residential radii. Ticks, for example, are also coming into the province, which is new. The warming climate makes different pest species have different kinds of mating patterns and usually more successful mating patterns and propagation. So you have this problem with rats being able to move up. Alberta has an advantage in that it’s so far north and it has good cold snaps to keep them away. The problem is, as things increase warmth, cities get larger, more people move into the province and the industrial centers get larger, you have the possibility of rats coming in. Climate change is a real factor when it comes to all pest species.

Kent: What would your message be to Albertans going forward? Is this a realistic goal to remain rat free?

Darcie: We have to make sure that we’re letting the Alberta rat control program know if we see a rat, we have to check our RVs (campers) as they come across the border from B.C., make sure there’s no rats coming in. But the biggest thing is waste management. The biggest thing for rats and all pest species is making sure that we’re handling waste management properly. We need to make sure our garbage is contained and that we are throwing things away and not throwing things in the street. Just be aware of rats. It is realistic. We can keep them out, but I have spoken to some pest managers who think that’s impossible.