The Plague found in National Parks ?

[Another Kevin]

I hope you folks do realize that, if I ever go West to hike, a cat and tile-roofed shelter are going to send my pack's base weight off the charts...

They didn't have asphalt shingles back in 1667, and there was so much pressure on England's forests that they didn't use cedar shakes very much then, either.

Just don't sleep in rat boxes, and don't worry.

[Fredt4]

http://www.theguardian.com/science/2...ats-study-says

Don't blame the rats, it was the great gerbil and climate change

[Bronk]

This is also the origin of the saying "raining cats and dogs." Cats and dogs would sleep in the thatch, and when it rained so hard that the cats and dogs came down it was "raining cats and dogs."

[Wülfgang]

Is this sort of thing common in U.S. National Parks (or any other areas within the contiguous 48 states?)

Plague is found here almost every summer in prairie dog populations. They carry the fleas which are the vector for yersinia pestis, the bacteria that causes plague.

In most healthy adults plague is not a lethal disease; and if caught in time is usually treatable with common antibiotics. "Plague" sounds pretty scary but it is relatively common in dry western states. Not necessarily human cases, but animal cases.