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BURNABY, British Columbia, April 11 (UPI) -- When attempting to exterminate a rat infestation, capturing females is essential. Scientists in Canada have found a new method for luring female rats, combining sound and smell. By replicating the male brown rat's sex pheromone, researchers at Simon Fraser University were able to improve the effectiveness of rat traps.
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The brown rat is the world's most prolific rodent, and the invasive species' success is partly a result of its ability to avoid traps. The latest research, detailed in a pair of science journals, promises to turn the rat's strength into a weakness.
The research team was able to make the pheromone-laced traps even more seductive by replicating male rat vocalizations.
"We're beginning to speak rat," Gerhard Gries, professor of biological sciences, said in a press release. "We're beginning to understand their pheromones, chemical attractants, we understand their sound communication and can reproduce it, and we understand their food preferences."
Gries and his colleagues have previously developed effective traps for bedbugs.
The most successful traps look to satisfy an animal's basic needs -- sex, safety, sustenance and shelter. The newly developed rat traps do exactly that.
"The overall message, is that here is some great food to eat, and here is safety, because not only can they hear 'live' rats, they can also smell the male rat's sex pheromone," Gries explained. "Since it seems entirely safe, they enter the trap box, feed on the bait and are killed in the snap trap."
