SAN FRANCISCO
Rats! The perfect stocking stuffer
Shelter seeking good homes for maligned rodents
Steve Rubenstein, Chronicle Staff Writer
Wednesday, December 22, 2004
It's a lucky thing for two rats that they nuzzled the nose of a most kind-hearted woman Tuesday in San Francisco.
Because they did so, the happy rats will be spending Christmas in their new home and watching TV, instead of cooling their little paws at the animal shelter.
That makes 168 rats down, 38 to go.
The animal shelter is awash in rats this week, ever since three huge crates of them were dumped on a front porch on Haight Street by person or persons unknown. The rats were brought to the shelter, where they have taken over a suite on the second floor normally reserved for bunnies, birds and guinea pigs while frantic shelter workers call rat lovers, rat owners, rat support groups, rat do-gooders and anyone else who might have room for another rat.
In the meantime, three of the original 176 rats gave birth, as rats will, to 10 baby rats apiece. That boosted the rat population to 206.
"That's what rats do,'' said chief rat caretaker and apologist Sabrina Simmons. "They're just being rats.''
On Tuesday at high noon, the rats became eligible for adoption by the public. Lindsay duPont and her mother, Lisa, drove all the way from their San Ramon home, looking for just the right rat.
First, they had to run the rat adoption gantlet -- filling out rat forms, answering rat questions and presenting their rat cage for inspection. The rat adoption form has 114 interrogatories, including an entire category titled "hopes and expectations'' for prospective rat owners. Then there's the fee of $10 per rat, which tends to weed out snake owners posing as rat lovers in order to get their hands on something to toss to their snakes.
The duPonts passed muster, and their money was good. They were escorted upstairs to the rats.
Lindsay reached into a cage with two male rats, which scampered away. They were not the right rats, Lindsay said. Then she set eyes on another cage with six cream-colored females. Two of them obligingly crawled up her sleeve and nuzzled her nose, and the matches were made.
"It was the nose that sealed the deal,'' she said.
For a week, Simmons has been the hardest-working soul in town, managing to find spots for all but 38 of the rats. Most of them she farmed out to a pair of rat rescue groups.
There is so much anti-rat prejudice in the world, Simmons said, and it just isn't fair. Unfortunately for rats, they have been named rats. They also must suffer the consequence of having no hair on their tails, even though it's not their fault. And a domestic rat must convince any and all suitors that he is not a common sewer rat.
"Rats are terrific,'' Simmons said, as four rats crawled into the hood of her sweatshirt and took a nap. "They're cuddly and snuggly and very intelligent. They sit on your lap. But people look at their bare tails, and they decide they're not cute. That's the way people are. I don't take it personally.''
The main trouble with rats, said Lindsay duPont, is not their tails. It's their lifespan, which is only two or three years. DuPont has had 10 rats die on her.
"Each time, I'm a wreck,'' she said. "Losing a rat is the hardest thing in the world.''
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