Archive reports

Much has been made over recent years of the growing divide between rich and poor with the West growing fat and the rest going hungry. Celebrities are keen to stir up public awareness of famine, poverty and social depravation. So wherever incest is condoned, begging, vegetarians and Lepers are shot and travelling folk are forcefully moved on, Sir Bob Geldoff and Bono are quick to jump to the cause. If only George Michael or Paul Weller could have visited this locally renowned equestrian centre they could have got first hand knowledge of what the “Shitty End of the stick” really tastes like (an experience that Mr. Michael might possibly encourage).

So it came to pass, that after the success of the recent week day ratting, an invitation came to lessen a rodent problem on a site many Developing country leaders would have bulldozed for an Olympic stadium. Ryedale has had its fair share of flooding but if ever there was a drain from the local housing estate at Peasey Hill this was it. Not helped by the recent rains the grazing was less grass, more slurry; with the odd blade of floating silage and manure being the only colour to an otherwise brown ‘Somme-like’ expanse.

The hunt started at the usual ‘Spotted Cow’ with a gathering of troops and the swapping of stories. The convoy then meandered passed the allotments, through the Council estate and down a pot-holed dirt track to the livery stables affectionately called ‘El Passo’ (translated from the Spanish to mean: the passing of a motion, to excrete). After parking up, the terriers soon got to work along a hedge behind the Shanty stable block. What followed was almost Biblical on two accounts. Firstly the amount of rats that seemed to exit the site was of a similar proportion to a Moses Plague. Secondly the joy that came from such an exodus of detritus was a water into wine moment.

On loan terrier “Ruby” set about not only the local rodents but also her team mates fighting with most of the other attending terriers. However her battle with hard working “Cathra” was a scrap too far and she was yellow carded to her handlers vehicle. “Raymond” conducted himself in a quieter fashion dispatching rats with an often, unrecognised stealth. However it was noted that whilst battling between the Hawthorn hedge trunks, Raymond got a large thorn in his foot. Hobbling to a medic he managed to grab a rat on the way and shake it on only three legs. “Minty” arrived a little late but set to work immediately marking and pointing out quarry. “Izzy” and “Coco” darted between the hedge and stable bottoms and were more often than not seen with a rat in their mouths.

Whether it was the time of year or just the prolific breeding of the rat population locally, nearly every second rat was three quarters grown. An unkind stickman was stated as comparing the death of so many teenagers with a gun flailing American College. After losing many a rat to the sanctuary of the home made stables it was decided to work the inside of the compound. Many of the boxes stabled the rough coated ponies that one generally expects to find tethered by chains to roadside verges. Those loose boxes that did not have a tenuous equine resident, were occupied by either poultry or goats. This made raiding the palette tied buildings difficult and so concentration was focused on the caravan and midden that protruded from the swill fields like castles in a moat.

Coincidently as the ratting team entered the site bound by the sort of rusty, sharp spike topped, fencing found in a Hammer House of Horror yet the ‘Horse and Hound’ would whole heartedly condemn, a number of questionable looking people seemed to arrive and lerk in the shadows of the stabling. Whether they were returning to their homes after a hard days work robbing corpses from graves or they got wind of strangers discovering the sort of sordid secrets an Austrian might find in a neighbours blacked out cellar, they curiously, yet defensively hung around like ants might defending their nest.

Pickings were as thin inside the fencing as the paid grazing. That added to the co-ordination of some of the new arrival, resident stickmen, whose birth in the stabling had serious genetic implications to who they could marry meant what few rats were spotted, seemed to escape.

As the Ratcatchers appeared to become outnumbered and a pair of banjos duelled from the back of a horse trailer that also had a guard dog chained to it, a decision was taken to leave the land that time forgot before our terriers became more of a main course than a rat coarse. Two team photos were taken, the first of those from people wanting to escape the smell, the second from those wanting to escape with their lives.

The Ratcatchers would like to thank our contact for the invitation and hope that all the rats that escaped will be there for another hunt, RSPCA allowing. We hope our visit and the quarry that was left went towards feeding the families who reside in the stabling that “Goodricks” wish to distance themselves from. Finally and on a more personal note we would like to thank the event for allowing us to appreciate what we have; and that no matter what problems life throws at us at least we can get in our cars and drive away. Midge Ure, Paul Young and Sir Bob, perhaps Robert Mugabie was right, “A box of matches, and 5 gallons of petrol can cure a multitude of sins!!!!