On WNYC, to end the show every day during this membership drive, we're talking about all the animals New Yorkers love and care for in their homes, the pets. We've talked about

dogs, then reptiles, and on Friday, cats. Now we turn to some pets that the city spends a lot

of money and energy trying to eradicate, I mean rats, who along with hamsters, gerbils,

mice, and guinea pigs are beloved pets to many.

And we're joined for this by Anne Levin, executive director of the Brooklyn Bridge

Animal Welfare Coalition and co-founder of, and some of you may know this place,

it's Brooklyn Cat Cafe.

Anne, welcome to WNYC.

Thank you so much for having me.

So it might sound odd for the folks behind the cat cafe,

where you can play with and hopefully adopt a cat or two,

to also find homes for rats and other small mammals.

But I know you have a very sweet story about how rats and kittens can coexist harmoniously. You want to

tell it? Yeah. So our first rat experience was with a small feeling leukemia kitten who was

desperate for our companionship. And we were not able to match her with another cat because of her medical condition. And so we found a

rat that needed rescuing. And they made great friends that had a great friendship and had a

lot of fun playing and interacting with each other. And it was a really lovely story.

And that rat just made the few months that the kitten lived incredibly happy and then went on to play and interact with a lot of other kittens and had a great time.

And we've had other rats that have been super maternal or paternal,

depending on the sex, caring for little kittens,

caring for other animals, and just being super sweet.

I realize most New Yorkers don't enjoy the rats that most of the rats that they see, but

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