The Paris Underbelly: Secrets of Animals in the City of Light
The Paris Underbelly
By Comte de Saint-Germain
From Darkness To Light: Secrets Of Animals In Paris
If you’ve ever stepped on dog poop on a Parisian sidewalk, you know Parisians sure love their pets more than keeping their city tidy.
But what about animals that Parisians have no control over, and yet share their city with, from tunnels to towers?
Tiny Devils
The smallest Parisian animal is also the most reviled, and it’s the only one that attacks humans daily, in their own homes: bed bugs.
Thought to be largely exterminated in 1950s Paris, Cimex lectularius came back due to mass tourism: cheap airfares and AirBnB meant that an unprecedented amount of travellers could get into people’s homes, sometimes bringing these unwelcome guests with them.
Hotels are silent about it, but do take the matter seriously, as any infestation can kill ratings—and their business. However, private renters are often slower to react: the apartment may appear pristine, but all it takes is one infested suitcase from the previous guest to contaminate a mattress.
The city administration launched a massive awareness campaign to inform people to go beyond the stigma, and to help break transmission chains. Top travel tip: store anything you can in the bathroom, as these tiny devils hate tiles and porcelain, so any belongings you put there should be safe.
Real-Life Ratatouille
The pest that has been getting the most coverage, both internationally and locally, is clearly the rat. Viral videos show news crews reporting in front of iconic monuments, only to be photobombed by busy rodents.
Taking a page from the crows, rats have even learned to bite through the bottom of public bin bags and work as a group to extract their contents and store it in their burrows. They're most visible near parks at night, but you can spot them between the hedges near the Louvre during the day, and some even settled in the grass patch on the top deck of a péniche moored near Notre-Dame!
Even outside of picnic spots, locals got a reminder of the size of the rat population (more than 1.5 times the number of Parisians) when garbage collectors went on strike to preserve their pensions. The mountains of garbage bags became an open-air buffet, and even the poshest areas got numerous visits from their underground neighbors.
Not all Parisians hate rats: sewer workers know that they are an important part of the city’s waste disposal network, as they digest tons of solid garbage that would otherwise completely clog the sewers. Animal rights activists in city hall have tried to fight the rats' bad reputation by referring to them as “surmulot” (another name for Rattus norvegicus) but the pushback, from elected officials to social media has been fierce.
The rats' latest claim to infamy is to have burrowed through the roots of the oldest paulownia tree in Instagram hotspot rue de Furstemberg. Already fragile, naturally made of very lightweight wood prone to falling on unsuspecting passers-by, the tree was no match for the rodent's incisors.
Which brings us to the one true fact in otherwise idyllic Ratatouille: the shop window proudly displaying a dozen taxidermied rodents is real, and the pest control company Maison Aurouze can still be found at 8 rue des Halles. To help them avoid this fate while keeping the rat population under control, please never ever leave your picnic leftovers on the ground.
Cuteness Overload
While unpopular species have invaded picture-perfect locations, the opposite is also true. The Père Lachaise cemetery may be seen as a grim and foreboding place, but it is also home to Parisians’ absolute darlings: fox cubs!
They are very scared of humans, so only one person gets to see them on a regular basis: Benoît Gallot, the cemetery’s curator, who lives on the grounds and regularly runs into them outside of opening hours.
He wrote a book about his experience (La Vie secrète d’un cimetière) and his Instagram account is a thing of beauty, where he describes how even he has to hide between tombstones to catch the elusive furballs .
Foxes are classified as pests in France, so could be hunted down… but hunting is illegal inside Paris, so the cute redheads are safe.
Ending On A High Note
In the “Rose” edition of The Paris Quarterly, you learned about the very special floor of Saint-Sulpice church, but if you follow its gorgeous architecture to the top, you may spot several graceful peregrine falcons. Parisians like them both as a protected species, but also because they hunt the much-hated pigeons.
For the past three years, the couple of peregrine falcons on the Saint-Sulpice towers has been feeling safe and welcomed enough to produce two offspring every spring, the latest born in May 2023 are called Carla and Jules.
Download The Walking Tours
Episode 1: Around Montsouris
You may have heard of this 14th district park, but the surrounding arrondissement has an incredible history: nearly 2000 years of ruins, visible from its streets, and locals ranging from the first Black star of Montparnasse (before Josephine Baker!) to a leftist lesbian painter who became a heroine of the Resistance during WWII.
Episode 2: Above The Catacombs
This brand new tour will take you on a part of the Paris meridian, and on the footsteps of gentleman thief Arsène Lupin, above the underground locations that were used to film a very special episode of the hit Netflix series.
Learn about the legal & not-so-legal uses of the catacombs over more than five centuries.
More About The Count
The Count of St. Germain invites you to unique walks through Paris. Let his voice and your smartphone’s GPS guide you to (re)discover the City of Lights, embracing the authenticity and subjectivity of a person who actually experienced the events they’re recounting.
