Rats

[Chickenlover88]

What is the best way to control them? I have 2 kittens but they aren't big enough to do any damage some of these rats are almost as big as them. What is the best way to get rid of them. Not sure I could poison them because I have 3 dogs and 2 cats that could get into the poison. They are too big for most traps...Thanks for any suggestions you can give me! I want my ducklings and chicks to be able to live outside without fear of a rat eating them.

 

[andischickenfarm]

I've read that you can take a piece of PVC pipe (the size you think the rat can fit in) and put some poisoned bait in the middle of it and that way the dogs and cats can't get it but the rat will crawl through the PVC pipe and eat the bait and hopefully die! I hate rats! They ate 15 of my baby chicks in one night. I was so sad and then I was mad! Good luck and hope this helps!

Andi

 

[seedcorn]

Poison is the best method, kills them quick. Put it under something the rats can get to but your cats can't. Farm stores carry a "bar" bait that does a good job. Easy to use.

 

[lurky]

I have a hav-a-heart trap that i got @ the feed store and it would be a good size for a rat. Then you can just re-home the rat in a woodsy area. It seems mean too but i guess its better than killing it.

 

[thechickenwhisperer]

Only problem (from what I understand) is that the rats can CARRY the poison away-thereby dropping some. I'm not sure even tucking it inside something will work if your pets can get anywhere near the dropped food (it must be appealing to the tastebuds to animals otherwise the rats wouldn't want it). Something to consider.

 

[Chickenlover88]

That is why I have held off on poison. I really love my dogs and cats and don't want anything to happen to them. I have a shed that they have chewed holes in the floor. They enter it every night. I'm guessing though that there is still a possiblility of them carrying the bait outside of the shed. Another thing that worries me is one getting killed by the poison and crawling into my ducks pen and dying and getting eaten by him. It really kills me to have to kill animals. We did make a humane trap out of wood that works very well but it only catches one at a time and I know there are much more than that.

 

[Judymae]

My in laws have a detached garage that was just loaded with big ole fat rats. Some so big that their bellys hung over both sides of the 2x4 rafters. I freaked when I saw the 'big one' the first time. They put out the poison because the dogs didn't have access to it. The rats ate the poison and then wandered out to the backyard with the dogs and died. One of the dogs ate one of the dead rats. She was deathly ill. Cost them close to a grand to save that poor dog. It seems that the poison kills the rat by clotting its blood so when the dog ate the rat it clotted her blood. Be leary of poison for anything!

 

[Yonaton]

It doesn't matter how big the rats are...a rat trap (*NOT* a mouse trap), WILL kill a rat. Best place to put them is inside a shed or something that none of your other animals ever get into.

Poison is IMO, the worst thing to use, for anything. As another poster said, the dead rat will still contain the poison in the carcass and anything that comes along and munches on the carcass has a very good chance of dying too. Poison is far too indiscriminate.

 

[Chickenlover88]

Yeah that is definatly why I have held out on the poison so far. I had the biggest rat trap you could find and it still didn't kill the rat. I have four of them and the rats here will trip them and escape. I only manage to capture the medium-small ones. I ended up having to hit the poor thing in the head with a hammer to humanely kill it because all the trap caught was her neck she was running all over the place and still alive. It was the biggest rat I had ever seen.

 

[Yonaton]

Hmmm...that's a shame to hear that the trap won't kill the big rats. Seems like the saying 'they don't make 'em like they used to' holds true even to something as simple as a good rat trap. Do a Yahoo or Google search though for rat traps. I seem to recall there was a new type of trap that didn't look at all like typical traps and it could break a finger it was so strong (like the good ol' timey traps could do).