rats

[Mr J]

The dog and cat solutions offered here would not suit me. I would find myself in a situation where I had maybe solved the rodent problem, but now had a pet problem. Cats and dogs need feeding and they crap in the garden. I have also heard stories of expensive vet medical bills. I do know some people with dogs and see dog owners on the beach and it seems they need walking too. When I get up in the morning I don't want to walk a dog, I want to go surfing.

Many regional areas of Aus, including where I live is overrun with rabbits. Some stupid aristocratic British migrants introduced them here for shooting sport - or so the story goes. Or maybe that was foxes. CSIRO the national scientific and research organisation has tried things such as unleashing virulent strains of myxomatosis to kill them, but it only has a temporary effect. I see rabbits scurrying across my back and front yards daily, however as far as I am concerned they are no problem. The droppings don't stink or stick to shoes. They are reputed to live in burrows, but I am not seeing any holes in the lawn. A farmer or hobby gardener trying to grow carrots would not be so tolerant.

When I went for a surf this morning at dawn a wallaby (sort of small kangaroo) ran in front of my car, but I always go slowly on the dirt track so no collision risk. They are not dangerous. I have heard that kangaroos can lash out if cornered - say by a stupid human chasing one to take a photograph, but normally they won't both people. As far as I know there aren't any aggressive mammals with sharp teeth in Australia. I just googled "are Tasmanian Devil's dangerous" and the answer is no. I don't live in Tassie anyway.

There are some reptiles with sharp teeth. Its too cold for crocodiles in Victoria, but poisonous snakes can be a problem. One of my neighbors did not get the grass cut all summer and it was pissing me off - looked unsightly and a snake risk. Gardening doesn't suit me, but I pay a gardener to cut the front and back lawns every 2 weeks and thankfully my absentee neighbour has decided to do the same - probably someone reported him (not me), or got a stern letter from the council. The only other land hazard I can think of is spiders, they can bite leaving difficult to heal ulcers. I have had some spiders inside my residences over the years, but I have never been bitten and just being careful and vacuum cleaning is the answer - pets won't help.

I suppose there is the mosquito problem I mentioned in my previous post. No malaria here, but Ross river fever sounds nasty. Anyone got any suggestions?

 

[SurfFuerteventura]

Quite the opposite, or as my french friends would say, au contraire mon frair!

Cat, never fed, never pet is your best bet.

But a lil rat dog will do too.
Just make sure you feed 'em irregularly, and forget the walks... they get plenty of sport/excersize keeping the house and yard clean.

Fugget about those guys walking dogs, feeding them and paying vet bills... The animal is a tool, like a good drill or hammer, not a domestic pet for show and status.

Folks in underdeveloped areas know what I'm talking about.

 

[grapedrink]

Quite the opposite, or as my french friends would say, au contraire mon frair!

Cat, never fed, never pet is your best bet.

But a lil rat dog will do too.
Just make sure you feed 'em irregularly, and forget the walks... they get plenty of sport/excersize keeping the house and yard clean.

Fugget about those guys walking dogs, feeding them and paying vet bills... The animal is a tool, like a good drill or hammer, not a domestic pet for show and status.

Folks in underdeveloped areas know what I'm talking about.

 

[afoaf]

let's not forget about dogs on anti-anxiety meds

talk about missing the fkn point

 

[PJ]

let's not forget about dogs on anti-anxiety meds

talk about missing the fkn point

We were putting thermostats in a small condo building in Brooklyn 20 years ago. One of the residents gave our tech their business card - "Cat Psychologist"

 

[SurfFuerteventura]

People and their 'pets'.

 

[potato-nator]

My Vet is pricey.
They got me.
They know it.
I pay.

 

[donuts]

repost - man’s best friends shake some action...

 

[theramrod]

We call small red drum rats, or rat reds. I was giving a fishing report not long ago to a coworker and told him "I caught about 5 or 6 rats but nothing else". He knew what I was talking about but an office mate from Argentina who speaks good English but gets lost in our slang overheard this and stopped us talking with "You were fishing and you caught rats?". The look of confusion on his face was priceless.

 

[donuts]

rat poison!

 

[CCKeith]

rat poison!

dumb tenant did this in a building i managed. nice way to get everyine to hate you

 

[rowjimmytour]

Set rat and mice traps make sure traps snap towards wall so they don't escape side step and place more then one next to each other. Use almonds for bait but first soak them in h20 for half hour and remove excess h20 in paper towel and store in plastic or glass jar. Break off 1/4 for mice traps and half for rats. I like the snap traps best.
https://www.acehardware.com/departments/lawn-and-garden/insect-and-animal-control/animal-traps/7201981

 

[kelly7873]

Set rat and mice traps make sure traps snap towards wall so they don't escape side step and place more then one next to each other. Use almonds for bait but first soak them in h20 for half hour and remove excess h20 in paper towel and store in plastic or glass jar. Break off 1/4 for mice traps and half for rats. I like the snap traps best.
https://www.acehardware.com/departments/lawn-and-garden/insect-and-animal-control/animal-traps/7201981

Almonds are one of my favorite baits for roof rats too but why do you soak them? My trick is to drill a hole in them and use a twist tie to attach it to the trigger. Snap traps are best because they are cheap and you can buy a lot of them, you want to saturate the area. Set out lots of traps with different baits but don't set them. Find out which baits and what places the rats like. Let the rats get use to feeding out of the traps for a couple days then set them. Rats learn too quick to catch all of them, now you need to set out poison. I've used poison on rats often at work and it's rare for one to stink, but I'm in Hawaii where it's mostly all single wall construction. I don't know what happens to the rats after they eat the poison but I've been told they get thirsty and go out looking for water before they die.

 

[PJ]

Almonds are one of my favorite baits for roof rats too but why do you soak them? My trick is to drill a hole in them and use a twist tie to attach it to the trigger. Snap traps are best because they are cheap and you can buy a lot of them, you want to saturate the area. Set out lots of traps with different baits but don't set them. Find out which baits and what places the rats like. Let the rats get use to feeding out of the traps for a couple days then set them. Rats learn too quick to catch all of them, now you need to set out poison. I've used poison on rats often at work and it's rare for one to stink, but I'm in Hawaii where it's mostly all single wall construction. I don't know what happens to the rats after they eat the poison but I've been told they get thirsty and go out looking for water before they die.

Mice are smart, too. When I was young and dumb we lived in an apartment. There were mouse droppings on top of the stove almost every morning. I bought a Have-A-Heart live capture trap and put it on top of the stove with a peanut in it. After we went to bed, 11:15pm I heard the trap doors clang shut. I got up and put the trap with the mouse inside into a shoe box so the other mice wouldn't see. The next morning I took it to the woods on the way to work and left it in an open tin can with a little seed to get its new life started. That happened two more times. The 4th time my wife, who never lets knowing absolutely nothing about a subject prevent her from having a strong opinion on it, told me to stay in bed - that I was absolutely stupid for thinking that mice could learn - so I left the trapped mouse out overnight. The mouse well dried up after that but the droppings well did not. So yes - like Kelly said - I put peanuts out on the stove top and in the un set trap - after two nights just the stove top ones started disappearing and over a week they started taking them out of the trap. Then I was back in business!

Then we moved to the country and I was overwhelmed by mice and lost all sympathy. When you can hear mice in the attic at night and see droppings in your kitchen drawers it changes your perspective. I've used all sorts of traps - zappers, rubber band type, etc. . Yes - the basic Victor spring type trap is probably the best but sometimes for something elusive I'll use glue traps. I had a very picky mouse in the attic once and had to use at least 3 different baits to trap it. They cut down a lot of trees across from me one fall and I had two 8" long rats climb my AC Freon lines and eat through the sealant at the wall penetration, get into my garage and pull all the insulation out of that part of the wall to make a nest in my shelves. I killed one with a big Victor spring trap and found something furry with my hand (EEEWWWW) in a dark corner of the garage the following spring which was the second one which had died of poison I guess.

These days I always leave some poison in the garage - some pellets and the green block kind also - I drill a hole in the block and tie it to something with a wire and look every day for signs of missing pellets or chewing of the block. I don't get mice in the attic any more. Sometimes I'll find one dead in the attic or something but they seem to sort of dry up without much smell.

 

[hammies]

Get a cat. Feed them outside. Feed them once a day. They'll solve anybody's rat problem in a one acre radius. My grandfather had a medium size, like ten acre, avocado orchard in Somis and he kept few cats. They'd come to the shed to get fed at night, he would pet them maybe once or twice, and no one else could get near them. They were killing machines.

Where I live outdoor cats are Coyote snax.

 

[rowjimmytour]

Almonds are one of my favorite baits for roof rats too but why do you soak them? My trick is to drill a hole in them and use a twist tie to attach it to the trigger. Snap traps are best because they are cheap and you can buy a lot of them, you want to saturate the area. Set out lots of traps with different baits but don't set them. Find out which baits and what places the rats like. Let the rats get use to feeding out of the traps for a couple days then set them. Rats learn too quick to catch all of them, now you need to set out poison. I've used poison on rats often at work and it's rare for one to stink, but I'm in Hawaii where it's mostly all single wall construction. I don't know what happens to the rats after they eat the poison but I've been told they get thirsty and go out looking for water before they die.

Keeps them fresh longer reason why peanut butter is bad idea dries right upand only attracts ants.

 

[afoaf]

Where I live outdoor cats are Coyote snax.

start trolling the humane societies for troubled cats

once they are fixed and vaccinated, feed them outdoors and let the mayhem ensue

 

[Autoprax]

repost - man’s best friends shake some action...

The rats are like waves in Oside during a long interval NW swell. The dogs are surfers.

 

[freeride76]

This is what they do here, only local story is if you want them to keep feral, best no feed and never pet.

Locals laugh at our fat domestic cats. "2 cats in the yard, life used to be so hard...". Wifey is a CSNY fan.

But we have another couple, or three possibly, in the backyard grow area. They are like the locals, or maybe even are theirs. Anyway, me no feed, no pet. They regularly leave me field mice sans livers. My cats split fast at the mere sight, or sound, of any one of them. My cats make our dogs run in fear, cause though fat, they are still cats and can blind you in a bounce. They don't catch anything though, who would if you know when feeding time is, and it's regular?

We do have one dog though, a rabbit hunting breed. Podenco Canario. He's huge.

View attachment 111260 He's the one who keeps the rest of the yard critterless. He especially likes the lizards.. only he licks them to death.

Best of luck with the "worst housesitter ever" award afoaf. And remind me NOT to leave you with our keys.

do those goats need much water?

I like the look of them.

 

[ghostshaper]

had a female rat sneak into our garage. tried to catch her w/ every trap possible. she didn't touch the snap traps or the electrocution motel. she chewed the corner of our garage where the door meets the wall. lined the inside and outside of that area w/ glue and snap traps. she would push the glue traps out of the way.

then she had babies in our garage. I started catching them in snap traps when they were about a month old. caught 6 and was hoping it wasn't a big litter. never caught the mom. too goddamn smart!