With the province in an uproar over rats being discovered in a Medicine Hat landfill recently, Bonnyville has done its due diligence by sending a pest control officer to help exterminate the rodents.
Kirby Claybert, pest control officer for Bonnyville and surrounding area, went to Medicine Hat on Monday, Aug. 20 and stayed until Friday, trapping, baiting and exterminating rats. He will also spend a few days down in Medicine Hat again this week.
“It seems like it's probably a lot worse than they reported. It was just about 100 dead rats. The whole west bank of the landfill seems to be pretty infested,” said Matt Janz, director of agriculture services for the MD of Bonnyville, during the council meeting on Aug. 22.
Though there are more rats than initially reported, Elden Kozak, assistant fieldmen for the MD, said the situation is under control.
“It's not out of control. They're all limited to one area, which is this landfill. So things aren't quite as bad as they may have seemed. They're pretty much situated in the landfill and with all the food you've got in the landfill there's not much reason for them to leave,” he said.
Kozak said Claybert, along with other pest control officers from across the province, have been using a number of techniques to help rid the city of rats.
“Between setting out bait stations, traps, maybe a little bit of shooting,” the numbers are dwindling, explained Kozak, who said only about four live rats were spotted last week.
“The rats are hard to see, they're pretty nocturnal.”
Kozak expects the rat problem to be resolved next week.
“From what I understood this morning (Aug. 24) from the emails, they're winning the battle.”
After the rats are exterminated, a monitoring program will be put in place.
“They'll have cameras set up at night. They have game cameras set up so they can see movement in the landfill,” he said.
Kozak and Janz both said they are not sure when exactly the rats came to Alberta but have a good feeling they've been there for a while.
“Being so close to the border, I'm sure they probably just came in from Saskatchewan or they probably just came in with garbage from Saskatchewan. But once they get into the landfill and start to multiply, they're not easily going to move but it's a tough spot even to bait them with all the garbage and food around,” said Kozak.
On top of baiting rats, Claybert and the other pest control officers are working with City of Medicine Hat staff to train them in how to get rid of the rats.
Though Kozak said it is “unfortunate” to have rats in Alberta, the fact that they have been able to mitigate the problem is “proof” that the Alberta Pest Monitoring Group (which Claybert and the other Pest Control Officers are a part of) works.
“This is proof that the Alberta Pest Monitoring group does work. Without the program, we wouldn't have a leg to stand on,” said Kozak. “They find these spots and they go in and eradicate them. Within a few weeks hopefully we will be back to usual.”
