Hmm. Now I’m tempted to do some in gingerbread.
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I’ve had good luck with the plastic “Tom Cat” brand of alligator traps. The only ugly scenario I had was one night (and I heard it snap) where the rat apparently only caught a front leg in the trap. I heard the “SNAP” and thought “there goes another one”, then heard a ton of scuffling outside. I thought “Oh Crap! Did I catch a cat or a possum?” Nope a rat by the front leg that had to be manually put out of it’s misery.
Also, anyone who is considering poisons, check this out:
http://npic.orst.edu/factsheets/rodenticides.pdf
I personally wouldn’t consider a poison in any place where wildlife, pet, or child exposure was even remotely possible. I’ve treated too many cases where a pet was exposed, either directly, or indirectly through eating a weakened hemorrhaging rodent.
Take a look through Shawn Woods’ prolific collection. I’m wondering if it might be worthwhile to make a larger version of the impressive rolling log trap for rat-sized players…
Meanwhile, YouTuber Jack Doggerdog’s souped up his traps predominantly for big rats…
https://www.youtube.com/user/jackdoggerdog
And if all else fails. 22-caliber air rifle mated to a night-vision scope with laser sight and a rooftop perch seems effective for exorcising your inner Lee Harvey Oswald
…oops… all of the above was meant to exterminate the vermin in THIS post:
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I am not sure I’m gonna keep up the 100% hit rate, but I bet the snap traps thin the mischief pretty well. I am hoping to knock the population back enough they are no longer a visible presence. I do not like my backyard feeling like a Chicago alley.
I had to resort to poison in Sausalito the rats seemingly knew to knock traps over and then eat the bait. I would like to avoid that here because even tho I doubt anything people value will get into the baits directly, owls and hawks seem to frequently suffer secondary poisoning effects around here.
If I can’t knock the presence back with lethal but environmentally friendly methods, I may resort to a couple weeks of having some less secondarily lethal baits out to really do the job.
When I was a kid one of my jobs would be to put liquid cyanide in a little tin lid…looked like water. Next morning I would have to go out and get the dead rats and bury them at the edge of the field. They would always be within a few inches of their last drink. It came in a brown medicine bottle labeled as cyanide and marked with a skull and cross bones. You could get it at the hardware store. Same store sold dynamite by the stick or a box. Amazing to think about such household conveniences now.
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I really like the traps that you pinch closed from behind - they are trivial to set, and have been very effective for me. Like any trap, make sure you tether it so if/when the rat kicks and squirms, they won’t take it back deep in some hole you can’t get to (or don’t want to get to).
https://www.amazon.com/Trapper-Rex-Traps-Case-12-traps/dp/B002Y5MVO2
Someone needs to make internet aware traps that text you when they go off. Make IoT stand for Internet of Traps.
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Please. Poisons may be a nasty business; but they are nothing if not elegant. Especially since rats develop bait aversion quite readily, so additional subtlety is required.
So much fascinating biochemistry, so many places where a carefully crafted malicious input can disrupt it…
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Be very glad they are outside, and try not to go off the deep end like the guy in this film:
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They’ve moved into my yard, attracted by dog shit in the yard next door; a 24 hour all you can eat buffet.
We need packs of free range terriers;
[A] group of four ratters in Cornwall, in 2004, recorded killing more than 2,000 rats in a single day on a free-range chicken farm with 10 terriers, mainly Jack Russells, two Plummers and a Sealyham
Read more at http://www.thefield.co.uk/country-house/ratting-with-terriers-26835#TpZbsbFoeVwW036U.99
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Agreed. Not too sure about the sayin’ of it, but I can sure do the hell out of it (soldering, that is). Cheers!
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In the 15 years we’ve been in our house, I have seen 2 whole mice. All the other mus and rattus are generally in half or other parts, thanks to the 3 Stooges who live outside, and Junior and Zorro inside. Hey, the cats do their share for household income.
Good goggie!
I am a convert to the T-Rex traps in a locked Sidekick baitbox. They usually dispatch them but if it doesn’t just drop the whole baitbox in a bucket of water. The baitbox makes sure you don’t get say your nosey dog and the structure is perfect for directing rats over the trigger. You can also leave that setup safely in the yard waiting there for the next wayward rat that wanders near the shed.
Cat. Ours kills & eats rats, mice, birds, gophers, baby rabbits, etc. The only downside is stepping on a gut-bag in the middle of the night.
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I have two pet rats. They’re very intelligent creatures that are easy to take care off. They’re scent discourages mice too.
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“Thus always do I, a common rat, erase death”?
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Two things 1 Remember them infesting my grandfathers rat pile and when I lived over on Kains St. there was a wood pile right in my very own backyard It provided large Norway rats for my Jack Rusell to play with he would run around with them in his mouth and toss them in the air and catch them and many bring one home to me half dead 2 where I am now I had a serious infestation of tree rats (their the little native kind of rat) and unfortunately my Jack is now too old to do any thing about them so they were raining down from the ceiling on me when I went out in the kitchen at night used rat bate spread it all around undertake house that night they had a party just eating it up I staid up a while listening to them they didn’t even need any music
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Get the sidekicklockable baitbox for those. It is designed to fit the T-Rex. The rats can’t drag the trap away and you can just dump the box in a bucket of water if you need to finish off the rat.
Be warned: All Tunnels Lead to Skavenblight.
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My husband swears by the snap-traps, and his fingers are strong enough to reset those. I have only partial use of one hand, so I stick to these electronic zap-traps indoors, in dry areas, where spring-traps get sprung, robbed, and remain frustratingly empty. These work pretty well as long as you keep the baseplate (conductive) shiny clean:
http://www.victorpest.com/victor-electronic-rat-trap-bm240
Outdoors, against exterior of shed or house, sprayed at the foundation, this works pretty well:
I spread the mulch in a thick bead along the base of interiors like sheds and garages and basement. I get a few weeks of protection before I have to “recharge” it with the liquid Cedarcide. Not great for asthmatics indoors. I am told that cats also have metabolic pathways that end up damaging their livers with essential oils (like cedar oil). Caveat emptor.
@jlw, if you don’t plan on burning your wood right away, dousing your cord of wood with this stuff will definitely drive them out of the pile. Where they choose to go next… not so sure. The volatile organic compounds in the oil eventually break down. Will these clog your woodstove’s flue? “Not if your fire is hot enough” is what my wood-burning friends always argue.
Sometimes we have to up our game and use attractants on the snap-traps, because mice and rats do learn, dangit.
I am really going to have to rethink my notions of living with a terrier (any terrier)…
… wow. I currently live with a 70+ pound rescue dog with an extremely developed prey drive, and he takes care of any vermin in our living space. And often outside too. Eeek.
If you are lucky enough to live in an area with snakes–any snakes–but especially a rat snake
… and if you could just hold off on the poisoning just a bit, the local snakes do show up (assuming they haven’t been exterminated where you live), and they definitely eat your rodents. The world has a lot of kinds of rat-eating (and mouse-eating) snakes. Nocturnal predation by owls and snakes (assuming it’s not freezing cold outside) will work on nocturnal rodents. Heck, even the smell of a [rat]snake is usually enough to cause entire rodent colonies to relocate. I have firsthand experience with exactly that.
Hawks and eagles hunt during the day, and that works great if your rodents don’t sleep all day. Out here I mostly see these birds of prey eating squirrels, rabbits, other birds, and the occasional snake.
Final caution: if you have anything tasty to a rat (pet food, grass seed, beeswax, soil amendments like bloodmeal or earthworm castings, etc.), and you don’t already store those in a galvanized steel trashcan, get a decent metal trashcan with a tight-fitting lid you won’t have to keep shut with a bungee cord. Rats can chew through lead, cinderblock, brick, mortar, aluminum, wood, glass, vinyl and galvanized steel (eventually), but the metal does slow them down quite a bit and they may just leave for easier pickings elsewhere.
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