The effort to solve a growing rat problem in the Treasure Valley appears to be causing new problems of its own — and one Boise neighbor is speaking out after his cat died from rat poison.
Kellen Williams has lived in Boise for 21 years, growing up in Ketchum, Idaho. He and his family intentionally avoid using poisons of any kind, relying instead on spiders to mitigate pests and cats to mitigate rodents. Williams says his cat, Jekyll, had always been a mouser, keeping rodents away from his Boise home.
Jekyll was 12 years old and had grown up alongside Williams’ oldest child, who was a toddler when they got the cat. Named after Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde — sweet most of the time but occasionally feisty — Jekyll was mostly blind from fighting with neighbor cats, but was still a reliable mouser who mostly stayed in the backyard.
But earlier this month, an emergency vet visit revealed Jekyll had been exposed to rat poison. After about 36 hours of not eating or drinking, Williams took Jekyll to Intermountain Animal Hospital — other clinics like Cat Doctor were fully booked…