Help With Rats

[aprophet]

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X2 be careful with this one works really good ,it is really dangerous

you need a muskrat colony trap scaled down just a little bit you set it in there travel ways where they are crawling under the coop the tunnels they travel


http://www.catfish1.com/forums/f184/building-folding-colony-trap-92377.html

good luck I build them slightly different then this guy but his will work you prob just need the 4"X4" OR 5X5

 

[Cluckhead]

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Wow thats a lot of rats. I did the plaster ball thing and haven't seen one since. Good luck.

 

[goldnchocolate]

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The Plaster of Paris turns solid in the rats intestin and everything backs up.

When I tried the plaster of paris method all it did was make them poop white turds.

I used the PB/PP recipe for a few weeks and all it did was make them very healthy

but they loved the balls so much that I started adding D-Con pellets into the mixture (like chocolate chips in a cookie dough) and they gobbled them up. Within a week I had no more rats but you have to be very careful because several of the rats died out in the open.

To the PP who would never poison: I tried all other methods to get rid of the rats but I must have had at least 100 of them, tunnels everywhere and in the evenings I used to listen to them chewing away under my back hallway (carrying the wall insulation to the outside

). I finally said, "Enough is enough--no more mrs. nice guy". There is no way I would rehome my chickens just to spare the rats from poisoning. The chickens live here, the rats were unwelcome. I would have liked to avoid poisoning but sometimes you have to do what you have to do.

 

[halo]

Just now I walked out back and saw my first small black slithering snake.....he dashed away so fast I barely saw him, but Im very glad to see him. I know he's on Rat Patrol.

 

[goldnchocolate]

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My rats were huge, though. Would a snake still eat those?

 

[aprophet]

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My rats were huge, though. Would a snake still eat those?

one place I lived I had a black snake( aprox 6') lived in my shed he would any and all rats baby rabbits mice etc all part of the circle

 

[Randy]

If the black snakes would stick to rats and mice I wouldn't have a problem with them. They seem to find eggs easier to catch though. Then there are those that like to go after my young chickens. I had one snake that killed some half grown pullets. He tried but couldn't get them down. Just left them dead with thier heads and necks all slimey.

 

[HathawayHens]

Mrs. K :

My husband puts the poison in pvc pipe (the white plumbing pipe) only rats and mice can crawl in and get to it. works for us in the barn and garage.

Years ago, in a terrbile house, I put moth balls in the basement/crawl space. That kept them out of the house.

Please be aware that after the rats and mice get the bait and eat it, they crawl off somewhere to die, and scavengers (including possibly your chickens!) will eat the dead rodents, ingest the poison, and die as well. Please reconsider rat poison... it does not solve the problem, as there are always more rats... you need to rat proof your area!!​

 

[Stina]

I never thought a rat was very smart but these things seem to always get one up on me.

Rats are EXTREMELY intelligent.....which is why they're used in so many behavioral studies....and one of many reasons they (domestic) make wonderful pets (they can be trained pretty much like a dog)......and unfortunately why they can be such frustrating pests.... I happen to have both pet AND pest rats.....I LOVE my pet rats.....but the ones outside are driving us NUTS! I REFUSE to poison the pest rats.....not just b/c I think its a TERRIBLE way for them to die, but b/c I don't want anything else, especially my dogs, to end up poisoned. We just bought some big traps to try...see how that goes..... At the very least at least the wild rats around here seem to look very healthy and we don't have anything out there now that is feeding them, so they're healthy on their own......**shrug**​

 

[halo]

I dont know if snakes will eat those huge rats, but they sure as heck will eat all those babies and knock the population right down. I dont see hardly any snakes, but I dont see any mice or rat evidence, so either they are here, or they were here.