A rodent control plan should be talked about in every chicken 101 book but sadly it is not. Many get overrun by the time it is apparent they are even present. But that just the thing- they are always present and we merely provide the feed for population explosions. If drowning stations and traps are set up from the start there is a chance one can keep mice, rats, chipmunk and squirrels at bay but even then there are years they get out of control.
Once your overrun there is really only one option and that's poison. Once I was finally coerced by the rodent residence to use poison I've never looked back. So simple and if done right is extremely safe to use. I use chunx bait and tamper proof bait boxes. I keep one right in the corner of the run or corner of coop stilts next to the hanging feeder. In three years I've only found one dead rodent (chipmunk) on the lawn in morning when going to let the chickens out. 99.9% of the time they die in the holes in ground. With the chunx bait rodents need to chew it off so there is no pellets strewn about from falling out of their mouths. The boxes come with key so completely tamper proof, don't use with chicks in run. Simply put I love this system and know how I lived without it- lived with rats and other rodents that would get into the house come fall. Now I don't. You'll go through a lot of bait chunx initially until the population is eradicated then the boxes only need baiting every few months and that's just to keep fresh bait in there. I run only two chunx per box now and it's just old and barely chewed when replaced every three months or season.
This is an example of what I use:
Once your overrun there is really only one option and that's poison. Once I was finally coerced by the rodent residence to use poison I've never looked back. So simple and if done right is extremely safe to use. I use chunx bait and tamper proof bait boxes. I keep one right in the corner of the run or corner of coop stilts next to the hanging feeder. In three years I've only found one dead rodent (chipmunk) on the lawn in morning when going to let the chickens out. 99.9% of the time they die in the holes in ground. With the chunx bait rodents need to chew it off so there is no pellets strewn about from falling out of their mouths. The boxes come with key so completely tamper proof, don't use with chicks in run. Simply put I love this system and know how I lived without it- lived with rats and other rodents that would get into the house come fall. Now I don't. You'll go through a lot of bait chunx initially until the population is eradicated then the boxes only need baiting every few months and that's just to keep fresh bait in there. I run only two chunx per box now and it's just old and barely chewed when replaced every three months or season.
This is an example of what I use: