Caught the rat!
We've been on the trail of the rat living under our chicken coop
for a couple of weeks now. While you'd think rats are a cosmetic
problem, they're actually very dangerous as we get close to chick season
since rats can demolish a flock of fuzzy babies in short order.
I started trying to catch
the rat while Mark was away visiting his parents in Ohio in
January. I stopped after a couple of failed attempts, though,
because I was afraid of hurting Lucy...and was also afraid of snapping
my fingers in the trap. Mark has a certain calm focus that's very
handy when using chainsaws and setting rat traps, so I let him take care
of round 3.
The good news?
Within two hours, the rat was dead. The bad news? An hour
later, Mark saw another rat. This one wasn't interested in
following its coop-mate's path to the happy hunting grounds in the sky,
so we're back to the drawing board. How to catch a now-trap-shy
rat?
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About us: Anna Hess and Mark Hamilton spent over a decade living self-sufficiently in the mountains of Virginia before moving north to start over from scratch in the foothills of Ohio. They've experimented with permaculture, no-till gardening, trailersteading, home-based microbusinesses and much more, writing about their adventures in both blogs and books.
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We had a horrible problem with rats in the Louisiana. I got expert help and it worked. First, get the largest wooden snap traps you can, for the neck snapping. Next put them at least 3-6 traps along the edges of your barn walls (where the first rat was caught). Rats follow their pee trails along walls. Make sure you fasten the trap down, nail it down or use a string to keep it in place. Keep a map of where the traps are.Rats will eat their dead and carry the carcass and the trap away if not fastened.Check your traps at least once a day. Peanut butter is mana to rats. They love it. Smear it on the trap, then set the traps. As soon as the night falls, you should hear the snapping of the traps. If you are getting them in the daytime, you have a serious problem. We store our feed in metal trash cans and old chest freezers.You have to keep your feed away/sealed from your barn.I caught 20 rats in 3 days. We finally put our feed in trashcans and the non working chest freezer and no more rats.Cats and rats snakes are a big help.My guineas eat the baby mice and rats if they see them. There is a cage you can use where small rodents fall in and can't climb out, but they are alive. And you will have to deal with that.Or you can have water at the bottom : http://afieldandafloat.files.wordpress.com/2010/07/rat-trap-worked-blog2.jpg I hope this helps you on your quest for less rats. Good Luck.
Just wanted to comment that peanut butter has been my best bait as some of the other folks have mentioned. We had over 10 attacking the pantry and we eventually got them all with peanut butter. They chose the traps over the pantry, they loved it so much.
I'm new to your blog and I love it! I just made a bee watering station and blogged about it with a link back to your article that gave me the idea. Thanks for all your tips!
"A Jack Russell Terrier. They won't stop until the rodent is dead, and they won't hurt the chickens"
Yes, humans created terriers for just this reason. However, I'd recommend keeping a dog away from areas with rats or their urine until you vaccinate your dog for Leptospirosis, and don't skip the booster shot to be administered 3 weeks later. Leptospirosis is a zoonotic disease, which means it can be spread from animals to people. I live in NYC, where their have recently been several dogs infected with Leptospira bacteria; the health risks can be deadly. IIRC there were also 3 recent human deaths in the Bronx.