Can't get rid of rats

[smcapstick]

Concrete.

That, a clean farm and a few cats.

 

[JD-Kid]

I thought it was a myth that rat men had better poison?

i know here with out a lic some types of poisons can not be brought and some products lic'ed users can get are stronger than what is sold retail to farmers etc

big thing is they know how to use it better in most cases

 

[Hedge Hunter]

cats rule tyhe land here.

 

[Gone Shooting]

Havin a blitz here now we have time - taking a fair bit of bait although its funny that they ignore some stations even if close to each other - using clay pigeons under pallets etc works well and away from dogs.

 

[caveman]

The most important thing to do first before any trapping/baiting is to deprive them of any free sources of food

Give them plenty of free and easy to get at grub. But in a vat or tank that they can get into but not out of. Vats of milk with a ramp for access is a good one. They stop swimming eventually and you don't even need to waste an airgun slug on them.

 

[Paddington]

We tried one of those "rat only" poisons that are supposed to be safe with cats and dogs around, well the rats loved it, as fast as we put it down they ate it. Under laboratory conditions it was shown to be highly effective but they removed any other food and water for the rats so pretty useless for typical farms.

 

[Pola]

Professional pest control from Hereford, My mate , nickname Ratter 07860 484 400. Top service, plus he travels. Local athority & defra approved.

 

[Paddington]

How about a 6kg belligerent, bellicose tomcat? Ours would sharpen his teeth on my Achilles tendon and knock the rear legs from under our 35kg Lab cross before a nights ratting. Once behind the henhouse there would be a lot of squealing and yowling and he would emerge preening his paws to scratch another cross on the henhouse door. Mice were beneath him, just too small worth bothering about, he would then come into the house and curl up on my lap on a cold winters evening when I was sat at the computer before going out on his evening rounds. We never actually saw the bodies, but he assured us they were all out there..

 

[Sonny]

Get a couple of terriers

Get

Cats will take out every small predator you have near you, stoats need a rat a day and weasels more because they need to feed more often and like fresh, warm meat. Whereas a cat will only take a rat a day and all the competitive predators it can kill as well. They'll also hammer your local songbird population, cross-compliance?

Trying to get people to recognise the damage that cat's do is not easy because of the folk-memory and animal-loving press they get. Don't get cats, their benefits are all myths!

Do make sure your place is clean of all easy pickings for the rats and places that give them shelter, other than that the above give good advice.

 

[Flintstone]

Had a rat problem for ages and poison just wasn't getting rid of them completely.

Got three ferals, and there wasn't a rat to be seen after 10 days. That was 8 years ago. They're the only sure fire way to control Rolands.

BUT....you must feed them. If you don't they get weak and won't kill. Too many people think they kill for food. They don't. They kill for fun, it if they're not strong they won't do any work. A big heap of dried cat food replenished once a week is fine.

 

[Bogweevil]

Bait boxes seem to stop the rats making off with the bait and stock-piling it. They have to eat it in situ, which seems to work better.

I like to keep some traps going, but leave them unset until the bait is being taken. They work best above ground level of course. I feel the rats get a bit woozy if they are slightly poisoned and become less trap-shy so even if resistant or have taken a sub-lethal dose they are destroyed.

 

[Hilly]

I've not seen a fox come out from a ferret, I'd have thought it would have chopped the ferret but perhaps it's the human smell so close that spooks it?

One weird thing I did see in Herts was a ferret that escaped out of its hutch during cleaning and it went into a car-port and up between the twin plywood walls, about forty glis glis shot out from all directions and were running around the top beams like nutters; made me jump like hell at first. Not surprised that they ran from the ferret, very surprised that there were so many in one place.

A cousin in Scotland put a terrier into a hollow tree thinking a fox was in there and got a hell of a scare when two big feral cats came out the top and straight over him.

Ferrets are excellent at bolting foxes, strange but true.

 

[cudota]

Mix pink plaster with barley

whats your mix ratio

 

[Sonny]

Get

Get your violin out to back up my rat problem. I moved from So California 3 years ago to Northern California when I became disabled. I bought the best house I could afford on disability with 2 bathroom so I could get a housemate. In So Cal Vector Control handles pests with a phone call. They put mosquito fish in my pond, sterile mosquitos and traps in my fruit trees and would provide snap traps and raccoon or rabbit cages. That lifestyle is over. From photos I bought this house from the bank in a fishing town. I volunteer at a cat rescue once a week just to get out of the house a few hours if I feel well enough. The fisherman keep cats on the docks to control varments so we feed them, nueuter, vet services. It sounds like a rat hitched a ride home from work in the harbor. But we have cats to eat gophers and mice outside. Cats are amazingly mysterious. In California we have daylight savings time and even with that the cats go out on the docks and return by closing. We don't name the cats but the one tearing through gophers I brought home for 3 days because she got locked out one night not getting to the rescue bldg before close of business. Her first night she went to the creek behind my house filling up on frogs and birds in the blackberry bramble. Did I mention I live in the redwood forest at the beach with Elk, deer, bobcats, horses and cows - yes cows in a parking lot utters bare and all. Racoons and opossum are road kill in this housing tract. One might think my house is a double wide, however, it actually has a redwood frame and flat roof with a raised foundation. No construction value of Redwood. This redwood is 2000 years old that is no longer harvested, but protected. First sign of rat, I heard chewing paper noises under my bed. A flashlight didn't reveal anything. Unfamiliar with indoor rodents it was in the box under the bed. Night two my beagle was in my closet howling at 11 pm. I baited her out with chicken and kept the door closed. Next day she had no interest until 11 pm. Howling again. My pants on the lower rack revealed under her tail. I piled the pants on my bed to get a better look, moved plastic bins of scarves and found a milk bone in the corner. She does bury bones but she couldn't get past these bins that are graduated; top touches wall but not base. I took bone but she was vicious, chewed through baseboard, drywall, nails. I got my fathers cane (RIP) to try to grab her by the colar. She ripped a gaping hole larger than a magazine. A scary hole spiders or disgusting banana slug could crawl up. My neighbors are close enough to see their TV and on my east the new neighbor was reroofing, building a greenhouse and tilling a garage-size patch of yard. A fisherman with fisherman friends he had two smokers of meat in the yard for all the workers and big pile of wood in yard, 30 fish buckets and Ive never seen a dirtier house. The neighbors keep an eye out for me, alone with a disability. I called my east neighbor to apologize for noise until 2 AM when my 11 year old beagle needed a drink of water, an opportunity to shut the door and sleep in another bedroom. My neighbor replied with sticky traps he got about 20 in his house, as matter of fact. My coworkers all have 20 to 30 cats at their home all have rat infestations periodically. The next sighting I think I let something in the front door. Like lightning I saw a flash movement. Really? How could anyone shoot something that fast? A trophy to quick draw. It ran behind my monitor heater, something I particularly don't want to leak. My heater man found droppings in it- 4 service calls November/ December 2016 to get it to work. A piece of sand can shut it down so it may have just been a rat hair that froze me last winter. The exterior of my house is some kind of paneling named with letters and numbers that I can't remember only common up here that, given all the rain doesn't seem like a good idea. This house is all I can afford. I can only afford it with a roommate which I won't get with this problem. Spring is when recruits for medical and law enforcement is recruited, not many other jobs. My west side neighbor from Texas says he has eaten rats, cats, squirels. Wheres the beef? I have to charge my device so I will write part two, 2017 and todays nightmare. One

Get a couple of terriers

 

[davieh3350]

A bucket trap. Drown them. Works for mice.

 

[ollie989898]

I'll whisper it quietly but glue board work fantastic.

A good general tidy up of the place is well advised. Then find a man with a nightsight and punchy air rifle.

 

[Turra farmer]

Mix pink plaster with barley

Will they eat that ?

 

[Clive]

Sticky traps will destroy a population if you use loads of them for a month or so

 

[llamedos]

Sticky traps will destroy a population if you use loads of them for a month or so

Have you managed to clear them using these? Couldnt get them to work for us, found lots of belly fur stuck to them along with a bit of blood, and then caught a Robin stopped using them after that

 

[Clive]

Have you managed to clear them using these? Couldnt get them to work for us, found lots of belly fur stuck to them along with a bit of blood, and then caught a Robin stopped using them after that

Yes had really good results with them, they vary in quality though, for rats you need the bigger ones with stronger glue than cheaper mouse boards