Rats!

[Deberosa]

OK, we are infested with the beasts. I mowed a section to the chicken yard gate recently - there are tall weeds on one side still and I apparently opened up a rat highway.

This weekend we were loading hay in the barn so were down there quite a bit - and saw many rats jumping back and forth across the path. Sat there with a bb gun but it wasn't accurate enough to hit them...

So I built one of those rat traps - with a barrel with water, a stick across the top with toilet paper rolls on it coated with peanut butter and a board leading up to the edge of the barrel. Smeared some peanut butter on the board. They don't work!

Then put out sticky traps - the rat sized ones. Caught one but he jumped to the weeds and pulled off the trap, so I only got some fur. Now the dang things sidestep the sticky traps!

Tonight they hid the entire time we were out there - now with the 22 and a scope.

I can't and don't want to do poison because of the dogs and cats. Dog would go at them but it's also right under the electric fence so dog stays away. Cat is too busy with mice in the barn right now - doing a good job but it's over load for one cat and the reinforcements are still kittens. ;D

Any other ideas on rat control that's safe for other animals? The chickens are all near this area also, though usually on the other side of the fence, however there is a batch of chicks that will soon be going back and forth through the gate - will have to pick up the sticky traps!

I thought I read somewhere that there is raw rice or something that I can put out that they eat and it swells up and kills them - but can't remember the details - trying to find it with google.

[WileyCoyote]

What about Rat Repellant?
http://www.critter-repellent.com/rat/rat-control.php

I found this on the 'net. I have not tried it. But its premise - utilizing the scent of fox and bobcat urine to make the rats think they are near a predator - is the same reason I use used cat litter around my garden to repel deer. Deer don't know the difference between housecat scat and bobcat scat so they avoid it. A horticulturalist and master gardener at a famous Southern Garden tour spot taught me that. Maybe this stuff works the same way. Or maybe you could try used cat sand or litter in their highway?

I had rats in my house once and used the snap-traps, but lawdy I HATED emptying them!!!! Sometimes they were stll alive; just had a broken leg or back from the trap...euwwwww.

Feelin for yuh...

[Deberosa]

Yeah, I saw the repellants but that will just send them to a different place on my property and it was a bit expensive. I want them dead! ;-)

[remington]

I would say rat terriers but you already mentioned the fence.

[msta999]

If you can find a place to put a few bowls of anti freeze, where your animals won't get at them, that would help. The rats drink the anti freeze and go down in some hole die. We used this method when I was a kid and it seemed to work. Or you can use coke cola "pop". They drink this and they build up gas, rats can't fart, then they die.

[annabella1]

instead of the toilet paper rolls on top of the water barrel, lay sturdy paper over the top and secure the sides with heavy duty tape or elastic bands. smear the middle of the paper with peanut butter and cut an x there. make sure there is a way for the rats to reach the top of the barrel. It also helps if you float some vegetable oil on top of the water in the barrel. The rats are attracted to the smell of the peanut butter and the oil, when they get to the middle of the paper they fall through the x and can't get out of the water and slippery oil and drown. You can make more than one of these with a 5 gallon bucket and it might be more successful.

[bookwormom]

annabelle, I read about that trap in conncection with mice and with them it would probably work. Unfortunately rats are very smart, they would catch on fast, you catch two rats and the rest won't go up there..
good luck Debbie, I feel for you. make sure all feed is in rat proof containers. rats are even leary of poison, letting one of younger and dumber ones eat something new to see if it will kill him/her. the pop might just work, get them addicted to junk food.

[EarthMother]

I read the other day that the rice thing is an old wives tale. The stomach acid or something like that digests faster than the rice could swell. The other point being you have to raise the water temp. before the rice will cook and swell. I doubt any animal has stomach :'temps close to 200 F. :'(

[Mad_Professor]

Big Ol' barn cats