I think I have a rat...developing story

[Xtina]

That's a good dog, Max! That's a GOOD DOG.

 

[greekbioguy]

trying to kill the rats leads nowhere because they will keep coming back no matter how many you kill. the trick is to not allow them to enter the coop.use 1/3 of an inch loop chicken wire (only very small door mice may be able to get through that) check everywhere if your finger can get through from the outside then rats can too.if you do not have a small cement wall buried around 30-40 cm round the coop they can dig under . you can either put wire mesh on the floor too or there is another trick you can do.

buy small rounded river pebbles (size around 2-3 cm ) they sell them at construction material places or at garden centers (you buy them by the tonne usually ) and place a thick layer round all the edge off you coop (around 20 cm thick) no small animal can dig through river pebbles because the tunnel just collapses on its head right at the start and they will give up any attempt from day one

 

[Xtina]

Sorry, I should have mentioned...the rat kill was only a result of the whole chicken coop and run being revamped to prevent rat access to food and to remove rat habitat. The removal of the debris under which the rats were living is what caused the rat to start running around in broad daylight, which is what resulted in my dog catching him.

We put hardware cloth underneath the coop and removed all the composting leaves and the yard waste bucket that they were living under. I still need to remove the bricks that they dug under.

 

[mkearsley]

Hopefully he's the only rat you had. My sister was having gopher problems in her little yard & found out that if you urinate on their holes, they don't come back.

Maybe if you're fence is high enough........

 

[Xtina]

LOL, that cracks me up. I'm sure not going to be trying that myself!

 

[PeepMama]

Thanks for the postings. I know know what has created the holes in the coop.

 

[Xtina]

Good luck. So far I haven't had any new problems, but it's only been a few days. I'm afraid that the chickens are scattering grain underneath the coop that rats could still get to, so I have to move my feeder. But there haven't been any new tunnels yet.