“Dry ice is the most effective thing to kill them,” said Schwartz, peering in between the branches of her Wisteria tree— this is one of their favorite hiding spots, she says.
“It’s very humane because they die in their sleep.”

Schwartz, who has been living in her north Dupont row house for more than 20 years, said that rats have always been an issue, specifically in the alley behind her house that she shares with an apartment complex and small restaurant. Though, after working to plug rat holes in the alleyway and encourage neighbors to secure the lids on their garbage cans, the rodent-problem waned.

“They all left, and for the last couple of years it’s been pretty darn good,” said Schwartz.

Everything changed when the neighborhood’s locally-owned and operated waste disposal and recycling business was acquired by one of the nation’s largest sanitation companies, says Schwartz. It was then that trash began to pile up and rats began to return— and fast.

Tenleytown Trash, formerly owned by lifetime Washingtonian Barney Shapiro, was sold to Republic Services, a nation-wide private garbage collection company, on June 1, 2021. Ever since, customers say the service has gone “.”

Dupont ANC Commissioner Matthew Holden said Tenleytown Trash serviced his condo building weekly, coming once to collect garbage and multiple times per week for recyclables.

“We never had a problem,” said Holden. “Then the new company brought them and it was like problems began immediately.”

At first, the sanitation company would miss a few days at a time, says Holden, but eventually, the trash began to pile up and service became nearly nonexistent.

When residents complained, Holden said the trash hauling company brought in additional dumpsters to curb the overflowing waste but “even then we couldn’t get them to pick the [dumpsters] up at the right frequency or consistently,” said Holden.

Since, Holden’s condo has severed its contract with Republic Services.

Washington, D.C.’s Dupont Circle neighborhood isn’t the only community battling the waste management giant. Neighborhoods from to to have reported overflowing dumpsters and littered streets, all of which point to Republic Services for the blame.

91���� made repeated attempts to contact Republic Services by phone and email to better understand the slew of complaints by Dupont Circle residents. In response, Republic Services sent a statement asking for customers’ patience and understanding.

“We are currently experiencing some temporary local delays with waste and recycling collections,” Republic Services told 91���� in response to the allegations of poor service. “Many industries are facing staffing challenges at this time, and the environmental services industry is no different.”

Trash and recycling collection companies across the country have reported staffing shortages amid the coronavirus pandemic, despite sanitation employees being considered essential workers.

Waste management companies have had a difficult time retaining garbage truck drivers since the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic due to illness, school closures, and a lack of affordable child-care options that require employees to stay at home, according to a by the Solid Waste Association of North America.

Simultaneously, garbage produced by housebound Americans has skyrocketed, resulting in mountains of waste.

Republic Services estimates that trash production per household has increased by since the start of the pandemic, and Jesse Maxwell, advocacy and safety senior manager at SWANA, says the rising trend in trash production isn’t going anywhere.

“In D.C., I think a hybrid work model is going to be much more common moving forward,” said Maxwell, who says SWANA itself has switched to the model permanently. “We’re going to see an increase in residential waste simply because people will be working from home, at least part of the time, probably permanently.”

Maxwell said that the pandemic has also fundamentally changed the way Americans shop.

“Obviously we’ve already been in a very Amazon-centric place, but as people switched to ordering groceries and having those delivered, I think some of that behavior of ordering-in is going to stay,” said Maxwell. “Once you’ve switched over, you’re not going back.”

As a result, the amount of packaging, shipping supplies and plastic waste will continue to be the driving force behind increased residential garbage in the post-pandemic world, said Maxwell.

In addition to shipping waste, trash being generated by households has spiked primarily due to the rise in personal protective equipment like plastic gloves, disposable masks and cleaning supplies. In fact, plastic waste generated worldwide since the onset of the pandemic is estimated to have reached per day.

Maxwell said the increase in waste means more frequent trips to the landfill for sanitation workers, which means more time and expenses for waste management companies like Republic Services.

“Let’s say that in a set period of time a crew could pick up 300 houses and take their trash to the landfill before the pandemic,” said Maxwell. “Maybe now they could only pick up 200 houses’ garbage in the same amount of time because they’re getting so much of it.”

As a result, Republic Services said its customers could expect to see a cost hike of for their waste hauling services.

However, despite making monthly payments, Dupont Circle residents say that empty pizza boxes, Amazon shipping containers and household garbage have continued to mount outside of their homes with no word on when they’ll be removed.

“I have not seen the garbage company pick up the cans since June,” said Schwartz. “One of the very nice tenants at the apartment next door is actually spending his own money on black garbage bags and bagging up the trash and piling it up next to the building to keep it as clean and as neat as possible.”

Despite residents attempting to remedy the problem themselves, when trash collection is overwhelmed, garbage in the street is like a vacancy sign for rodents. Washington, D.C. has for years, and has consistently ranked as one of the nation’s for the unwanted foragers.

Other than chewing through Schwartz’s end-of-the-season tomato crop, the presence of rats in compact metropolitan neighborhoods like Dupont Circle present a number of challenges. Most concerning being that urban rats congregate in unsanitary conditions, where they pick up harmful diseases that can be transmitted to humans.

Since the trash from neighboring homes and businesses began to collect in the alley outside of her home, Schwartz said that she has had to incur additional costs to keep the rodents at bay, including hiring multiple exterminators, building a new fence to surround the property, and installing aluminum sheets in her backyard to prevent the rats from burrowing into the ground.

“I’m not complaining about the rats because this is what happens when you live in a city, I’m complaining because we had it controlled,” said Schwartz.

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Since 2010, the area has seen five of its six hottest summers on record, and the changing rainfall and weather patterns are expected to increase flooding and drought. According to the Environmental Protection Agency, higher temperatures and water level changes are expected to increase flooding, storms and the amount of sewer overflow, leading to possible ecological change.

One of those changes is the rat population. In an emailed statement sent to 91����, Mayor Muriel Bowser said there’s been an increase in rodent activity in the District in recent years.

“This problem is not unique to Washington, D.C. and it is believed to be the result of warmer winters,” Bowser said.

Lisa Benton-Short, the program director for sustainability at George Washington University, said all urban areas are dealing with the impacts of climate change, but she attributed the problem in D.C. to the city’s inefficient management of food waste, not climate change.

“I really don’t know exactly how I would correlate more rats with climate change,” Benton-Short said.

According to the , rat populations ebb and flow depending on the season. Rodent populations are lowest in the winter when breeding is kept to a minimum. Annual breeding usually occurs in March as the weather starts to get warmer. With a gestation period of about three weeks, rats can have anywhere from five to 10 pups (baby rats) and can have three to six litters in a lifetime. Rats see another peak breeding period in September when temperatures cool in the fall.

A study published by the says rodent-related risks could be spiking due to human urbanization, climate change and a lack of combatting the rat issue.

Chelsea Himsworth is a veterinarian and a member of the , which is a study within the Canadian Wildlife Health Cooperative. It looks to understand the variables of rats in the urban area and found that environmental impacts on rats have yet to be fully understood. The study found that the factors affecting rat presence the most were land use, building conditions, presence of garbage and socioeconomics.

D.C. is expected to see a white winter and colder-than-average temperatures this year, according to Doug Kammerer, NBC 4 Chief Meteorologist. Whether the anticipated flurries result in a change in the District’s rat population remains to be seen.

The post The climate conundrum: Does weather impact rat breeding? first appeared on 91����.

The city is waging a pest control battle on multiple fronts to deal with its growing rat problem. DOH’s Rodent Control team works on the front lines. 

The team goes on regular patrols to check traps, destroy rat tunnels and cite businesses for leaving dumpsters open.

It’s an uphill battle, team members say. Rats build tunnels beneath soil and concrete, chew through garage doors and can squeeze through holes the size of a dollar coin, project manager Gerard Brown says. “You have to be smart to survive.”

Sylvia Cysiffary of Eastern Market says she regularly finds dead rats outside her home. She blames a nearby cafe that often leaves its dumpster lids open. Cysiffary runs a private Facebook page to inform her neighbors about the persistent rat problem.

Officials say Eastern Market’s rat population is the highest in the city, rivaled only by Adams Morgan.

In addition to traps, controllists manage rat populations by mapping underground rat tunnels with a chalk-like substance and then filling them with dirt.

Workers say more and more restaurants are leaving their dumpster lids open, providing rats with an easy food source. 

The city will launch a rat sterilization program in the coming months. Until then, it’s up to the Rodent Control team to keep rats at bay.

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