Topic summary
Rat flood
Extracted from the Wikipedia article Mautam.
During mautam, Melocanna baccifera, a species of bamboo, flowers at one time across a wide area. This event is followed invariably by a plague of black rats in what is called a rat flood. The bamboo flowering brings a temporary windfall of seeds, and rats multiply, exhaust the bamboo seeds, leave the forests, forage on stored grain, and cause devastating famine.