Rats???

[Rechicked]

I have had a critter(s) underneath my coop for about a month now. From the 2 tennis ball size holes and the fan-shaped discharged dirt outside of the holes, I'm thinking RATS.
They avoid the snap traps and enclosed baited traps. I've also tried putting onions, black pepper and peppermint on cotton balls down the holes and covering it in. Every morning, the holes are open again! My unwelcomed visitors have so far been content to staying under the coop but I'm sure they will soon try getting inside with my chickens. On top of that, the holes are inside the run and right beside the hatch door where the chickens come out. I don't want to open the hatch because I'm afraid "whatever" will sneak inside the coop.
As a last resort, I've thought about pouring a jug of bleach down the holes in the hopes that it will gas them out or kill them. Has anyone ever tried this? Will the bleach fumes come up through the wooden coop floor to my flock?

 

[Chickenlover0810]

bleach may deter rats, but it will not kill them unless you are able to get them to drink the bleach. This is likely not going to happen. Instead, you may want to consider one of the following methods to eliminate rats. Live Traps – A live trap is a cage contraption that traps the rat inside the cage once it enters.

 

[Acre4Me]

where are you located? Sometimes this helps bc certain critters are more prevalent one place or another.


Can you shoot water through the holes forcing them to evacuate, and have a friend nearby to help you spot whatever critters shoot out?

Borrow a game cam from someone to try to id a nocturnal animal.

look at your DNR website, they usually have local wildlife and nuisance wildlife parts of their websites. Of course, rats are everywhere, so DNR probably does not have a section on them.


A tennis ball sized opening could be many animals. Oppossum? Would guess not skunk bc you would probably already know by smell. Groundhog? one of these set up shop under my neighbors shed, hole not that big.

 

[JacinLarkwell]

I pour water in my mouse holes to flush them out

 

[LateBirdFarms]

If you're able to keep the chickens out of the coop, a reasonably easy way to eliminate a good number are the mole pesticide smoke bombs. If you're able to cover most of the holes. Of course this also means dead rats under your coop, which equals out to a bit of a stink when things warm up, if the few survivors don't consume the corpses left behind. If you're able to get a good amount of water down there and it's cold enough, you'll freeze a good number, but the little pests are really persistent. I have an issue every year when the farmers pull in the crops off the neighboring grain fields, you can literally see droves of them running from the machines as they tear up their burrows.

 

[Rechicked]

Thanks for the replies. I've thought of smoke bombs but because of the warning label, I'm afraid of catching the coop on fire. I live in the country in southern Ontario, surrounded by farmland. We've always had a small barn but I never noticed holes like this until I built the coop, although it could be just coincidence. Def not a skunk. There are opossums around also. I won't be able to flush whatever it is, out with a water hose until spring because we winterized our outdoor plumbing already. I can try buckets of water into a big funnel for now and see what happens. I've thought about the smell factor if I do kill something under there. I was thinking maybe lye or stall-dry and shooting it in the holes via reversed shop vac hose. But I'll worry about that later.

 

[Rechicked]

bleach may deter rats, but it will not kill them unless you are able to get them to drink the bleach. This is likely not going to happen. Instead, you may want to consider one of the following methods to eliminate rats. Live Traps – A live trap is a cage contraption that traps the rat inside the cage once it enters.

I have a live trap but it might be too big. It's big enough for coon and skunk sized animals and a rat might not trip it and possibly get out through the wires if it does get caught. Are there specific live traps for rats?

 

[Dusty Chicken]

My old coop had a wire mesh floor and feed would easily fall though onto the ground. It did not take long for the rats to dig tunnels under the coop to gather up all that feed. No matter how many I trapped I would have more the next day. Fortunatly, my dog loved to hunt them and that drastically reduced the population but did not eliminate it.
Do you know what is attracting the rats to be under your coop? Can you modify the coop in any way to eliminate them from tunneling underneath. Would an apron of hardware cloth help? Can you move the feed or reduce any spillage?

 

[Rechicked]

My old coop had a wire mesh floor and feed would easily fall though onto the ground. It did not take long for the rats to dig tunnels under the coop to gather up all that feed. No matter how many I trapped I would have more the next day. Fortunatly, my dog loved to hunt them and that drastically reduced the population but did not eliminate it.
Do you know what is attracting the rats to be under your coop? Can you modify the coop in any way to eliminate them from tunneling underneath. Would an apron of hardware cloth help? Can you move the feed or reduce any spillage?

My coop floor is all wood, no gaps or holes, so there's no food that could drop down. And my feed is inside also, in tight-lidded totes. I don't think the coop was targeted, just handy and kind of out of the elements. It does have a roof over that part of the run. I didn't bury hardware cloth around the coop but it's for sure getting done in the spring

 

[Dusty Chicken]

I didn't bury hardware cloth around the coop but it's for sure getting done in the spring