An Oban woman has been left unable to cook in her kitchen or spend time in her flat after she refused to share it with rats which have taken up residence.
Kellie McCuish, 41, of Hill Street, lives in a one-bedroom flat upstairs from her mother Mary McCuish, 61.
After spotting a rat in her kitchen, a rat’s tail coming out of her bedroom skirting board and hearing the creatures crawling about the home, she has lost weight and been unable to face food.
The family say the private landlord, Sam Silcock, has offered little or no help.
Miss McCuish said: “I don’t spend time in the flat at all. My mum lives downstairs and I sit down there from 11am until 9pm every day.
“I just come up to go to bed and watch telly. I don’t even go into the kitchen, the only time I use that room is to put on washing or use the tumble dryer. I don’t eat in this house at all.
“One night I heard something in the kitchen at 2am. It came running from the back of my tumble drier right underneath the sink. It was a big long black thing with a black tail.
“They are just running about on top of things in the kitchen. I always make sure there is nothing lying about.
“My health is getting bad, I’m down to six stone because I don’t want to eat. I’m so depressed. It just makes me feel sick all the time.
“In bed one night I could see a big rat’s tail coming right out from under the skirting boards.
“When environmental health came out last year they said there are rats everywhere in Oban.
“I asked the landlord to get Rentokil out and he posted me a box of rat bait. I have been complaining about the rats for two-and-a-half years.”
She said she has tried contacting Mr Silcock by phone and email and hasn’t heard back from him for months.
Mary McCuish said: “I can hear them scratching in the walls at night.”
Mr Silcock did not wish to comment directly, but said in correspondence with the P&J that he had sent the tenants rodent killer some time ago and thought that had been successful.
