Abstract

Urban greening has become an increasingly popular strategy to improve urban life and human health. However, there are indications that the presence and extent of urban greenness may increase the abundance of wild rats. Therefore, we investigated which environmental and socio-economic factors are associated with rat abundance, with a focus on factors related to urban greenness. We systematically trapped rats (222 Rattus norvegicus and 5 Rattus rattus) in parks and residential areas in three cities in the Netherlands. We modelled the relative abundance of rats against various environmental and socio-economic variables. In addition, we compared municipality rat complaint data with our trapping data and analysed trap success over time. We observed positive relationships between the relative abundance of rats and both greenness (NDVI) and different proxies for food resources (restaurants and petting zoos). In addition, there were more municipality rat complaints in residential areas compared to parks, while there was a higher relative abundance of rats in parks. Our findings corroborate that greenness is associated with a higher abundance of wild rats, and that municipality rat complaints may underestimate the abundance of rats in greener urban areas. This study provides new insights on factors affecting relative rat abundance in cities and can guide policy makers and city planners how to minimize rat nuisance in the greener parts of cities. By taking these potential effects of urban greenness on rat abundance into account, measures can be taken that on the one hand maintain the beneficial effects of urban greening, but at the same time reduce the carrying capacity for rats.

中文翻译：

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绿色城市地区老鼠数量较多

摘要

城市绿化已成为改善城市生活和人类健康的日益流行的策略。然而，有迹象表明，城市绿化的存在和范围可能会增加野鼠的数量。因此，我们调查了哪些环境和社会经济因素与老鼠丰度相关，重点关注与城市绿化相关的因素。我们在荷兰三个城市的公园和住宅区系统地捕获了老鼠（222 只褐家鼠和 5 只家鼠）。我们根据各种环境和社会经济变量对老鼠的相对丰度进行了建模。此外，我们将市政老鼠投诉数据与我们的诱捕数据进行了比较，并分析了随着时间的推移诱捕成功率。我们观察到老鼠的相对丰度与绿化度 (NDVI) 和食物资源的不同指标（餐馆和动物园）之间存在正相关关系。此外，与公园相比，居民区的市政老鼠投诉较多，而公园内的老鼠数量相对较多。我们的研究结果证实，绿色与更多的野生老鼠有关，而市政当局的老鼠投诉可能低估了绿色城市地区老鼠的数量。这项研究提供了关于影响城市相对老鼠丰度的因素的新见解，可以指导政策制定者和城市规划者如何最大限度地减少城市绿色区域的老鼠滋扰。考虑到城市绿化对老鼠数量的潜在影响，可以采取措施，一方面保持城市绿化的有益效果，同时减少老鼠的承载能力。