And The Country's 'Rattiest City' Is...

The Windy City is still the “Rattiest City,” according to an informal study.

For the third-straight year, Chicago topped U.S. metro areas in pest-control company Orkin’s Top 50 Rattiest Cities  list released this week.

Orkin ranked cities by the amount of rodent treatments the company completed in the year that ended Sept. 15.

While the ranking is less than scientific (and self-serving), there’s other evidence that Chi-Town belongs up there among vermin hot spots.

According to DNAInfo in Chicago, the nation’s third-largest city fielded 39,000 rat complaints in 2017 , a 30-percent increase over 2016.

“Chicago has tried just about everything to control a burgeoning rat population fueled by a construction boom and a mild winter,” the Chicago Sun-Times wrote last week. “None of it has worked in a city seemingly overrun by rodents.”

Yuck.

Here’s the Top 50.

1. Chicago
2. New York
3. Los Angeles 
4. San Francisco – Oakland
5. Washington, D.C. 
6. Philadelphia 
7. Detroit
8. Baltimore
9. Seattle – Tacoma
10. Dallas – Ft. Worth
11. Denver
12. Minneapolis – St. Paul
13. Cleveland – Akron
14. Atlanta
15. Boston
16. Hartford – New Haven
17. Portland, Oregon
18. Miami – Ft. Lauderdale
19. Indianapolis
20. Houston
21. Milwaukee
22. Pittsburgh
23. New Orleans
24. Cincinnati
25. Richmond – Petersburg
26. Sacramento – Stockton
27. Kansas City
28. Charlotte
29. Norfolk – Portsmouth – Newport News 
30. Buffalo
31. Columbus, Ohio
32. St. Louis
33. Raleigh – Durham 
34. Grand Rapids – Kalamazoo 
35. San Diego
36. Albany – Schenectady
37. San Antonio
38. Tampa – St. Petersburg
39. Rochester, New York
40. Nashville
41. Champaign – Springfield – Decatur
42. Greenville – Spartanburg 
43. Memphis
44. Phoenix 
45. Syracuse
46. West Palm Beach
47. Orlando – Daytona Beach
48. Madison
49. Flint – Saginaw 
50. Green Bay – Appleton 

More than 20 million rodents invade homes each year, Orkin said, and rats can squeeze through a hole the size of a quarter.

Keep that in mind while you wonder how your city will fare in next year’s list.