Ratinator??

[chickfused]

All works for me as expected, it sounds like you have a virus or some sort of browser malware. You'll have to seach Tractor Supply's website for the trap name of this thread.

 

[littlecoopnextdoor]

I've heard great things about mixing equal parts of Jiffy cornbread mix (small box, really cheap) and baking soda. You can either put a bowl of it in a cage so your chickens can't get to it or put it in a cheap plastic container with a lid, like a plastic ice cream bucket and cut a small hole about halfway up. We never had a problem, but our neighbor has so many that dig under her outdoor pens that the pens are caving in. She's tried a dozen things. Then she tried the above. The next day we found a giant dead rat in our front yard that faces her farm. I called her over, and she came running so excited because she said she found about a dozen dead rats at her place. Hubby used a grain scoop to pick up that one in our yard and guessed it weighed 4 lb!

It doesn't harm our pets should they get ahold of a dead rat that ate this stuff, but the principle is they can't pass the gas this creates, and they die.

although this will work, it's a rather cruel death as the animal will be in quite a bit of gastro pain before death. Snap traps are better, but they will take longer to lure into. Leave the traps baited but not set for a week, then set them.

 

[littlecoopnextdoor]

I am infested this winter. I didn't catch it until we were about 2-3 generations in. It's BAD.

In two nights, with two traps, I have hauled out 44 rats. (It would have been 60+, except one of the doors malfunctioned and got stuck open after a massive chonker jumped on it going inbound. Everyone left.) I think the door malfunctioned because the trap was set on a slightly angled bit of the coop floor, with a slight angle the wrong way making the door not want to close as much as the weight was able to pull. So when you set these, they need to be perfectly level or with the door part angled slightly downward so it's more inclined to reset. Or maybe wrap the weight bar with wire if your situation doesn't let you control angle - it wouldn't need much to make it a bit more heavy.

Tractor Supply had these on sale last week about 30% cheaper than I could find them anywhere else.

These are, by far, the BEST rat traps I have ever owned in my life. To dispose of your myriad of rats, you just toss 'em in some deep enough surface water (I use a creek) or they come with a perfectly sized drowning tray to fully submerge the rat trap. (The manufacturer calls it a "safe transport tray" in the packaging, but I think they mean transport to the rat afterlife.) Then do whatever you like with the carcasses. Feed the crows, the chickens, the worms, or the dump rats. Whatever - they're perfectly non toxic.

Best bait so far: Potato flakes, peanut butter powder mixed in, leftover Xmas cookies/candy, and dried grub worms. Also, last night, I found half a rat when nothing other than the other rats in the cage could have got it, so possibly dead rat is good bait too.

Edit: I should note, this is not an easy task for me. I used to keep pet rats. They are actually very friendly adorable creatures if you tame them down from childhood. But I can't have this much disease vector in my coop.

Edit 2: The design of these things is freakin' genius in it's simplicity. It reminds me of primitive fish traps.

Edit 3: Cottonseed meal (commonly sold as a relatively inexpensive fertilizer - 40 lbs for 60 bucks shipped(ish)) is an effective birth control agent in all mammals. The chemical with the magic function is called gossypol, be sure you read about it before following the next bit of advice. Make rat cookies and keep the cookies always available in bait stations where nothing can get it but the mice and rats. Effectiveness wears off about 4-6 weeks after stopping the feed. If you breed other mammals that eat rats/mice intentionally, this could harm their fertility as well. Throw a cat in the coop at night, bait stations with rat cookies, and leave the traps set. This is my current plan. And then shoot whatever's left with a revolver and rat shot if needed.

I also used to keep pet rats and they are so smart and friendly creatures. We had a really hard time having to kill a rat that was chewing our walls in the house. We named him because he was so smart, and we did bury him in a garden after he met his demise

 

[Doreeni]

Any real life reviews on the "Ratinator"? I was out doing my nightly thermal scanning for night crawling predators and heard some noise in my barn....turns out the rats are having quite a social gathering in there. Fortunately it's a ways from my house and chicken coop but I'm sure it's just a matter of time....I'm thinking between a decent trapping regiment and some nightly thermal shooting I can get them under control rather quickly. Oh and we have barn cats...apparently they are fed too well since that is there home they are sharing with the rodents.

Thanks in advance!!

I have one and it works fantastic. The problem is you have to haul the rats off, so I hauled them off to a nature area. I’ve probably caught more than 100.