A better rat trap?

[Howard E]

Posted this in another thread, but thought it might have merit to discuss on it's own.

For you rat trappers, this is something you might try.....and further modify it by hanging a mini snicker's bar from a piece of string from the center of the lid so rat has to go to the edge of the plank to sniff it. Juuuusssst out of reach.That might keep you from having to constantly keep putting new bait out.

Amazing to me how many youtube channels there are devoted to trapping rats and mice.

Most promising seem to be these simple "walk the plank" types and the rollers. Both seem to benefit from using a tunnel to get them off the bucket/barrel rim so they can't reach in. Rats and mice seem to like the seclusion and security of tunnels so will readily enter it.

Watch enough snap trap videos and all seem to have a problem in that the traps are too small for the rats. A bigger rat can reach a long way with his nose without hitting the trigger, or even if he does, when the snap bar comes down, his head and neck are not fully within the trap, so these traps miss a lot. Use of video cameras to record what happens is quit revealing. The modifications some use to improve on this are bizarre.

And watch enough videos of rat traps, rat killings with dogs, etc. and you quickly realize the futility of nabbing a few of them at a time if you are dealing with a massive infestation. I found out the same thing years ago when I tried to shoot flocks of starlings. I could get 20 a day, which seemed like a lot, until I realized the roost they were coming from held several hundred thousand of them.

Rat poison is about the only thing that is ever going to thin the herd enough to matter. But if poison isn't an option for you, then traps it is.

PS: If drowning rats isn't your thing, then put an ad on Craigslist for live rats. Perhaps some snake charmer in your area will buy them from you to feed the snakes? Turn them into a profit center!!!!

 

[Howard E]

Some new rat trap videos.....mostly offered as entertainment.....as previously said, trapping being more or less futile if removal of a large population is the goal.

One obvious problem with trapping rats is that most rat traps on the market today are not nearly large enough to do the job. Maybe for black (roof) rats, but not for the larger brown (Norway) rats. Here is evidence of that:

Trapping, however, does serve a purpose in monitoring populations. So if you could trap the biggest of them, it would be good to know. If rats are showing up in traps, and you don't have poison out, you may need to get busy again.

The first serious trap is the Spanish windlass trap. You can build this one yourself, and it will work on the very largest rat there is:

The next is a commercial type that was once on the market, but not today. I looked and these antiques can still be found on ebay. Somebody should start making these again. Don't know if they would work in a jumbo sized brown rat, but would be good to know if they do:

Lastly, I have been working on a prototype of yet another rat trap concept that should work for the very largest rats there are. Stay tuned.

 

[Howard E]

As promised, here is a seriously heavy duty alternative to your standard wooden rat trap. Code named "Howard's Big Hammer rat trap".



Some back story on the name. Back in 60's, a neighbor kid Tommy graduated high school then went off to serve in the Navy for a number of years. In 1972 he returned, and since he didn't have anything to do while looking for work, and we needed help, dad hired him on for the summer. One day Tommy and I were working on some farm equipment and we had a nut frozen on a 3/4" diameter bolt. Try as we might, we could not get it off. Tommy remarked that they had a saying in the Navy you could fix anything with a hammer. It not, you needed a bigger hammer. So I gave up on my 1/2" socket with breaker bar, retrieved a 3/4" socket with breaker bar......and still it wouldn't budge. So looking around, we found a 4' long piece of pipe to slip over the already big breaker bar and that did it. Nut still didn't budge, but we now had enough torque to snap the bolt off. The bigger hammer rule worked!

So the Big Hammer is a modified version of your standard weasel box, but uses a 110 body trap (conibear) instead of any dinky little rat trap.

I should say here and now, if you don't have experience with traps, and particularly so with this body grip style, be careful. Be very careful. This trap is not for the faint of heart. It is powerful and could easily break a finger or a small child's arm. If you have never handled one, expect to be terrified the first time or two you try to set it. If you are not concerned you are an idiot. It will certainly kill any rat going, any weasel going, squirrels, and likely baby possums and maybe half grown coons if they can get to it. The reason for the box is to limit the danger of any non-target species getting to it.....dogs, cats, etc. A big snake could certainly set it off too.



So this is what a body trap looks like when set and set inside the box. This trap is a BMI 110 magnum. (Great trap!).



This is the same box with trap installed and ready to go.



What the potential future victim sees.

This box has the flexibility to be a pass through trap (rats pass through it and get nailed in the process), or one end can be sealed up, and become a bait trap, with bait placed in the back to nab rats or weasels as the pass the trigger.

The wire can fold down to open and make a ramp. Held up with just a rubber band. Or if you want you can fix baits to the trigger wires.

This is a Duke 110 (which is not as good as the BMI), but notice the trigger here has two whisker wires hanging down.

Trigger should be centered, but even so, most animals are not inclined to get jabbed in the face by these wires, so tend not to. You could impale your bait on them, however. A pea sized piece of tootsie roll? Or on the tips to put a soft tip on them so a rat might pass and set it off in the process.

What the duke can allow you to do is bend those whisker wires 90 degrees, so you can attach a paddle on it, so as they scamper past it, trip it with their feet. I can think of at least 5 or 6 different ways to rig this trap.....it is that flexible.

Cost? Traps run $5 each and you can build the box for about the same. So about $10 total.

If there is interest, I can provide more details and how to construction photos. And a cut sheet if you want to use plywood to make the box. I used some scrap T111 siding left over from the Woods house build.

These do not require a lot of skill. Or as dad used to say, whatever defects there might be would not be noticed by a man galloping by on a horse at 50 feet. And the dead rats tend to not be too critical either.

 

[Howard E]

Interesting observation from back in my starling killer days.........I was shooting them out of a sliding glass door in our kitchen. Starlings were feeding on suet cakes about 30 feet away. Initially, they were so fearless you could walk out the door and yell at them and they would ignore you. But once the shooting started, they wised up in a hurry. After a few weeks, if you even walked past the door they would scatter. So how did they know? How did they know where the danger came from or that there was even danger in the first place? They would also post sentinels who scanned the horizon for danger and if a hawk showed up, one of them sounded the alarm and the rest fled.....no questions asked. But even chickens do that, so being aware of danger from hawks may be hard wired into their little bird brains, but knowledge of humans with air rifles?

I have come to believe many of these vermin are a lot smarter than we give them credit for and are able to think and communicate far more than we realize.

Perhaps the rats from NIMH were not so far fetched after all?

 

[SueT]

lol, the first video's disclaimer, "Don't watch if you don't like trapping, I don't want any bit-chin in the comments section..."

 

[aart]

I did notice the magnets, he was very clear and repetitive(in a good way).
One of the best vids I've seen.

Would love to get my hands on one of those, see how those magnets adjust...then reverse engineer it<smirk>.
But not willing to pay tho, as I don't have rat issues here(knockwood).

Had a bucket trap for mice, and it worked fantastic for awhile, then got nothing in bucket but snap traps were working.<shrugs>

Saw a program recently on PBS about birds solving problems, using 'tools', and learning from watching other birds, was fascinating. I imagine rodents have similar capacities.

 

[ChickNanny13]

 

[aart]

That's pretty cool.....wonder about it's longevity of effectiveness.
If the other rats see this happen to their brethren, do they get wise to it?

 

[EggSighted4Life]

That's pretty cool.....wonder about it's longevity of effectiveness.
If the other rats see this happen to their brethren, do they get wise to it?

I feel like IF they see it they may well wise up to it.

One reason using multiple techniques and baits and switching them up seems to be a good idea.

 

[Howard E]

BTW, on the rat trap in the video, in case you missed it, key feature would be the magnets that hold it steady and in place until the rats are on the end of the plank. Their weight then overcomes the magnets, which releases in an instant and dunks him. Trap then resets. Sensitivity can be changed by moving magnets closer or farther apart.

Second feature is the slick piece of plexiglass that prevents them from getting a toe hold on the plank. So once it trips, down they go. The ultimate "slippery slope"?

A creative mind could think of a number of variations on what to do with the captured rats. Instead of water, bottom could be fitted with a piece of pvc sewer pipe leading to a wire cage to accumulate live rats for disposal or sale. That would eliminate the mess of the water and dead rats, which brings up another question, which is what to do with the dead rats?

I put the recently deceased starlings on my compost pile, which lead to an interesting discover in that hawks would eat dead starlings. A Coopers Hawk might eat 2 or 3 a day.......and they would even go for a cold, stiff, 5 day old dead starling with no problem. Easier than catching a live one!