A side effect of the floods I hadn't thought about...
www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-18793045
I've never seen many rats near here and we haven't suffered flooding, despite heavy rain. But my cat brought in a medium sized rat many years ago and dropped it, still live, in the kitchen.
I put on my gardening gloves and closed doors etc to go about catching it. It headed for under the fridge but was too fat and got wedged. After it had been reasonably still for a while, I grabbed it's tail, and slowly dragged it out. Either that killed it, or it had died from shock or exertion. I took a photo of it and pinned it to the wall by my cat's feeding station, as he seemed quite proud of that one!
Last edited by: smokie on Thu 12 Jul 12 at 08:00
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Some estimates give 5 rats for every human being on the earth and that wherever you are, there is a rat within 15 metres.
More info here
www.the-piedpiper.co.uk/th1a.htm
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>> Some estimates give 5 rats for every human being on the earth and that wherever
>> you are, there is a rat within 15 metres.
Most people don't seem to realise that throwing out waste food for birds is just as likely to attract rats as it is to attract birds. We used to spend a fortune on expensive specialist bird food until I saw a rat climbing up onto the bird table. We don't feed the birds at all now. We now permanenly have rat bait stations at opposite corners of our back garden.
Last edited by: L'escargot on Thu 12 Jul 12 at 08:44
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Are you catching many rats in your bait stations? Rats arn't daft.I feed the birds with fat balls hung up in a net.Sounds painfull I know.>;)
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>> Are you catching many rats in your bait stations?
They're not rat traps. I have Neosorexa bait blocks ~ pushed onto nails in blocks of wooden board so they can't be carried away by the rats, and covered by a ridge tile so that larger animals can't get to them. At times when there are lots of rats they'll eat as many as three blocks overnight. Fortunately there hasn't been any sign of the blocks being eaten for several weeks. tinyurl.com/bl5bvb7
Last edited by: L'escargot on Thu 12 Jul 12 at 10:16
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Thats what I use down the allotment, it sure sorts them out after about a week or so! - Its also phase two type stuff, so it does for Warfarin -resistant ones as well. I think I must have been the only bod poisoning down there, because in three-weeks I got through 84 blocks! and only ever saw one dopey rat!. My chicken feed hopper now lasts 3 days longer before refill than it was doing, so there must have been some heap of them!
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>> ........ in three-weeks I got through 84 blocks!
Crikey! That's a lot of bait blocks in three weeks, and a lot of rats. Some people think that all they need is one visit from a pest control person and their problem will be over. As long as there continues to be a source of food nearby then the rat problem is likely to continue. Rats build a nest near where they find a source of food and breed like .... er ...... rats. The best anyone can do in that situation is hope to control their numbers.
Can you tell us the make, name, and supplier of the phase 2 type stuff please?
Last edited by: L'escargot on Thu 12 Jul 12 at 13:51
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>> Crikey! That's a lot of bait blocks in three weeks, and a lot of rats.
>> Some people think that all they need is one visit from a pest control person
>> and their problem will be over.
We have trouble at work with mice. Always plenty of dropped food never mind what they can find if they get into desk drawers. The get under the floors and use the cable ducts as mouse superhighways. They die under there as well. Most of the building is large open plan office space but a month or so ago one died under an little used small meeting room - when we opened the door the smell was awful.
Pest control guy's in about once a fortnight to top up bait.
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Yep! - Tis "The Big Cheese" all weather rat and mouse bait, comes in 36 block packs ( I got three!) off EBay. It seems very effective!
I had 12 bait stations dotted about my own and next doors allotment each with 3 blocks. The first week they were barely touched as Rats are suspicious creatures and avoid "strange" things that suddenly appear on or near their runs. Once the initial suspicion wears off they start investigating, and once they get a taste for it, they cant half shift it!, try not to get human scent on the blocks if you can avoid it! and keep stations topped up until it stops going, you will notice activity and the amount being taken gradually lessening as The poison starts working, about 1wk - 10 days.
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>> Rats arn't daft
That is an understatement. My mate keeps pet rats which he has taught to do all manner of things. Come on command, fetch a ball of paper and drop it at his feet, take a paper ball and place it in a pint glass and then take it from that pint glass to another, sit up and beg on command, spin on the spot three times on command..... And the speed with which they learn is incredible. He reckons all it takes to teach a rat to do anything is a handful of treats, and about 15 minutes.
Of course, I'm not advocating affection for wild rats which are indeed vermin and spread disease, but I've never managed to look at any rat in quite the same cold light since witnessing these rats of his.
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Yes, tame rats are all right although not everyone agrees.
Had a drink with my eldest daughter some years ago now in a Camden Town pub. She turned up with a friend who produced a white rat dyed turquoise - the colour went well with his pink eyes - out of her dress and put it on the table. Its name was Henry and it sat there politely eating peanuts which it held in its paws.
When the bar staff spotted Henry though we were all chucked out. Wimps.
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If they didn`t have a food license then you wouldn`t be allowed to have Ratortwo eh!
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Do the rats cause you any problems? If they are not at plague proportions and are not entering the house or doing damage to stored grain and the like why don't you just let them be? They are after all just part of the eco system and do no harm in the wild.
We use to have quite a few at the allotment until the foxes took up residence and now I very seldom see one - a sort of balance has been established.
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I've established a sort of balance in my garden with a .22 air rifle and a tin of hollow nosed pellets.
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Algiers is built on a steep escarpment running down to the sea. The town centre tends to be on the lower slopes and along the shoreline. Rich people live on the heights at the top.
In the downtown area there are in several places tunnel entrances that go back into the hillside. They are all closed off with steel grilles. After dark, a lot of very large rats, really enormous by ordinary rat standards, come out of those tunnels and scavenge for food in the nearby streets. They don't seem unduly shy.
A smallish hotel I used to stay in had one of these tunnel entrances a few yards from its door, at the bottom of a big stone staircase climbing up the hill. When I spotted the rats emerging from it one evening an Algerian acquaintance, former military security and quite a hooligan - he liked a drop of whisky and was a fairly scary drink-driver - insisted repeatedly that they were cats.
They were certainly big enough to deal with a skinny, starving Algiers moggy. Better fed and in better training.
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>> Do the rats cause you any problems? If they are not at plague proportions and
>> are not entering the house or doing damage to stored grain and the like why
>> don't you just let them be?
Click on Meldrew's link. Rats are sexually mature at 3 months and breed at a prodigious rate. One pair will result in 200 in a year. They have no conception of incest. They carry diseases. Etc.,etc.,etc.
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Rats are more of a problem in congested city's.I used to see plenty in London running about.
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Trafalgar Square underground used to be a good place for rats. I saw one chase and bite another, causing it to squeak, out of doors at West Hampstead station once.
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ive kept fancy rats for around 12 years now, they are extremely intellegent...but they chew through anything... they did my computer wires a few times and the electric cooker mains cable, how they dont get electrocuted is amazing...how im still here to tell the story is another
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>> heres my last one having fun
>>
>> www.youtube.com/watch?v=3JwLe1Uz7rs
>>
Brilliant! :-)
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Yes but unless you have something that is attracting the rats, like waste food or grain you shouldn't be besieged by them. Like any other creature their population is limited by the food supply and predation. If there is a plentiful source you will attract them however much poison you put down. If there is no food supply you won't have a rat problem.
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>> Yes but unless you have something that is attracting the rats, like waste food or
>> grain you shouldn't be besieged by them.
At the risk of being accused of repeating myself ............. "Most people don't seem to realise that throwing out waste food for birds is just as likely to attract rats as it is to attract birds." and ........ "As long as there continues to be a source of food nearby then the rat problem is likely to continue. Rats build a nest near where they find a source of food and breed like .... er ...... rats. The best anyone can do in that situation is hope to control their numbers."
Last edited by: L'escargot on Fri 13 Jul 12 at 06:37
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>> If there is a plentiful source you will attract them however much poison you put down.
It's the thoughtless neighbours that provide the rats with a plentiful source of food. One puts out food to attract badgers, one puts out food for their chickens, and one throws out waste food for whatever wildlife is around.
We try and control the rat population, for everyone's benefit, by putting down rat poison.
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You never control rats by putting rat poison down Les.They get wise to it.One of our cats is doing a good job keeping mice and rats at bay I hope..:) What if some innocent hedgehog takes the bait.
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I would agree Dutchie. If you have a rat problem the only way to control it is to remove the the attraction - food. Putting down poison is a short term measure. The rats quickly become used to it and avoid it. There is also a considerable immunity building up in the rat population to common poisons and you risk poisoning other wild live and domestic animals. The poison L'Escargot uses is toxic to cats and dogs for example.
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>> The poison L'Escargot uses is toxic to cats and dogs for example.
>>
(a) I can't stop other people from putting out food, and (b) my rat bait is covered by a ridge tile to prevent animals larger than a rat from getting to it.
Last edited by: L'escargot on Fri 13 Jul 12 at 10:07
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You're much better using a trap than poison. There's a real satisfaction to killings rats.
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I think I'm right in saying that it's a slow death for the rats, so what about any dogs or cats that catch them while they're dying?
They would be poisoned too.
Pat
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Yes - Warfarin causes the creatures to bleed internally. Not a pleasant death for any creature that eats the stuff.
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>> Yes - Warfarin causes the creatures to bleed internally. Not a pleasant death for any
>> creature that eats the stuff.
>>
Hence the hollow nosed .22 pellet.
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I would agree that shooting them is more humane. However I would still maintain that if you are constantly overrun with rats you need to look at what is attracting them and do something about it otherwise yo will simply continue to attract other rats to take the place of the ons you have killed. It's the same with any animal (even humans!).
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Most of the "Poisons" have an anesthetical element to them, the poisoned rats don't feel pain whilst they are dying, that's why they appear dopey! - they`re "out of it" ;-)
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Chances are the vermin will head off to the nearest water source as the poison gives them a raging thirst.
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BITEX is added to rat poison as it deters other animals from eating it, rats have no bitter sensation on the taste buds...
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"rats have no bitter sensation on the taste buds."
This interesting article by the amusingly named Professor Katz seems to contradict that
“Rats learn what food that they like from smelling the breath of other rats,” says Katz, an associate professor of psychology and neuroscience. “A rat will essentially say, ‘Hey – Fred ate that and lived to tell the tale’ so later, when that rat is offered a choice, he will gravitate toward the food that he smelled on the other rat’s breath.”
This is true even when confronted with very bitter tastes, such as raw cocoa, which rats generally do not care for. “And they will even make rat yummy faces to show that they’re enjoying the experience,” says Katz, who by now can read their facial nuances."
As has been said - clever things rats,
www.brandeis.edu/now/2011/july/katzrats.html
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farmers reccomend it, but like you say norfolk lad...where you eating tonight?
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>> .......... you need to look at what is attracting them and do something about it otherwise >> you will simply continue to attract other rats ...................
I can't stop neighbours from putting out food ~ badger food, chicken food, waste human food etc.
Last edited by: L'escargot on Sat 14 Jul 12 at 07:02
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Maybe if you have a word wih the neighbours Les and asked them to stop putting so much food down.If you mention that you have seen rats they might stop it.Just a thought.
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I was at my local residents association meeting recently and the question of foxes was brought up.
The participants to the debate ranged from those that were putting food out for foxes to those that were employing pest control men with rifles to shoot them!
The looks that were exchanged between them were of reciprocated mutual loathing and contempt!
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>> I was at my local residents association meeting recently and the question of foxes was
>> brought up.
>>
>> The participants to the debate ranged from those that were putting food out for foxes
>> to those that were employing pest control men with rifles to shoot them!
>>
>> The looks that were exchanged between them were of reciprocated mutual loathing and contempt!
>>
Nothing wrong with putting out food for foxes if it's liberally dosed with poison.
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>> Maybe if you have a word wih the neighbours Les and asked them to stop
>> putting so much food down.If you mention that you have seen rats they might stop
>> it.
I've mentioned it but their interests were in feeding badgers, chickens, birds etc as applicable. Their opinion was that it wasn't them personally that was oontributing to the rat problem, so it must have been somebody else!
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Rats don't like a 22' pellet shot at them.!
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Even less if you connect.
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I mentioned this years ago. When I carried out work at a local feed mill I excavated some concrete to find the Rats had tunnelled beneath and had stored sachets of poison in various locations. They are very clever indeed.
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About 2yrs ago, I discovered Mice had nibbled a hole in my wheel-barrow Tyre, (must have got a shock when the air came out!), and had built a nest inside!
The amount of food, grain, seeds, peanuts (obviously from someones bird-feeder, somewhere) and shredded newspaper (they knew how to keep warm) was unbelievable! - I raked as much as possible out with a piece of wire, then filled the tyre with expanding foam! still using it to this day! (handy gardening tip, dont fix a barrow puncture use that car-spray!)
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You bought a wheelbarrow without a spare wheel, Dev? Can't imagine anyone here doing that; a can of goo is no substitute, you know.
};---)
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It looked to be harder work getting the wheel off, and carting it to the garage! - to be honest, for what I use it for, the Expanding foam wheel has worked ok, however its getting slightly "lumpy" in places now! still, its better than not having one! or paying £30 squid for a new one!!!
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Didn't you have a spare wheel which is restricted to 50mph...
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Floods & rats - Meldrew
