Rats

[kiwigeo]

A vicious rodent attack at a Marlborough holiday park yesterday morning forced a woman to seek hospital treatment.

Despite the presence of her dog and three-legged cat, Lynne Henderson was attacked by a large water rat while lying in bed in her motor home at Spring Creek Holiday Park.

"I'm going to starve them now," she said of her animals' inability to catch the rodent.

Mrs Henderson, who lives permanently at the park in a motor home about 10 metres from the river, remembers feeling an animal, which she assumed was her cat, jump onto her bed.

When it was near her neck, she extended a hand to give it a pat. The startled rodent then latched onto her upper lip.

After hearing his wife screaming, Neil Henderson turned on the light to see a rat, which relinquished its grip and took off into the couple's bathroom.

"It was about nine inches long, very round and cuddly ... well, violent, actually," said Mr Henderson.

A large piece of plywood was used to board up the bathroom while he went to retrieve an air rifle from a friend at the park.

He could not get close to it because it was "bouncing off the walls and ripped the toilet holder clean off".

Too terrified to approach the rat on his return, he prodded it to move it from behind a toilet to get a clear shot.

He fired one shot into the "tummy" of the rat, which "made a hell of a squeal" and ran out the door and up a nearby tree. It has not been seen since.

Mrs Henderson said the rat bite had pierced her upper lip, which bled quite badly at the time.

Because rats are "infectious rodents", she made a trip to the hospital, where bemused hospital staff gave her a tetanus injection and a course of antibiotics.

The couple suspected the rat had found its way inside through a cat door.

"It's funny now, but wasn't at the time," she said.

"It scared the living s..t out of me."

[Nick]

I wonder if that's where the cat's fourth leg went? Hence the cat's reluctance to have a go.

"It scared the living s..t out of me."

The rats probably a bit shaken up too after getting an air gun pellet in it's guts!

[kiwigeo]

The dog and the three legged cat sound like a couple of deadshit pets. I would have stuck a couple of pellets into their arses once Id finished with the rat.

[Nick]

They aint pets, they sound more like free loaders

It's funny, I've just been on the holiday camp's website and they don't mention this on their news page.