Hi, just seen this post after we've suddenly had a rat on our bird table. This has never been a problem before, however next door have just had their house wall re-rendered and alot of internal work done so this may have upset a routine for them if they were unwittingly lodging next door! I've removed the food temporarily from the bird table but we retained the window feeders. I have also bought a bait station so hopefully that will move them on/eradicate the problem!
Jennym83 It sounds as though your situation is very similar to ours and, like Dove, we know of the odd case where Weil's Disease has been known to be fatal to adults. I'm afraid we've resorted to spotting their runs and placing a poison block (blue) in the most popular one. Within minutes we see the block being carried off, occasionally a second one, and we see no more rats. We take care to shield the block(s) from bird areas.
I had rats at a previous property. We had loads of goldfinches and they discard 4 out 5 seeds so there was always birdseed around the feeders. The rats arrived and burrowed around the area near the feeders (they had about 15-20 exits !) Poison, traps etc did not work. I removed all the feeders and ensured that fallen fruit apples etc were cleared up every day .. they were gone after a few days. I have feeders where I am now and goldfinches but so far no problem as the many doves & pigeons clean up every day, fingers crossed ….. the pigeon poo is not nice but beats having resident rats !
As Nick mentioned rats use runs. The best way to deal with them is by setting bait boxes on the rat run; they are available in hardware stores and look a bit like lunch boxes. If you set them willy nilly eg near the bird table they won't go in there. You'll often see 'discreet' bait boxes along the bottom of walls near bins at cafes and food outlets. That's the way to go.
I have a sectional concrete garage with a cement asbestos roof (we don't keep the car in there,) we had mice in there a few years ago so after catching them I had to remove everything to find how they had got in, there were a few small holes around the bottom where the sections of the walls didn't quite fit perfectly so I cemented them up and hey presto we haven't had mice since, there were gaps around the top of the walls where the roof corrugations sit on top of the wall but these looked too difficult to fill so I left them open. A couple of weeks ago I noticed a funky smell in the garage and thought either a mouse had got in and died or maybe a carrot had been left in the sand storage box and had rotted, as the garage had become something of a tip with stuff just thrown in I didn't investigate further, the other day I noticed that the bag the fish food was in had been nibbled so assuming mice I bought some traps and set them around the floor, the next day the traps were empty so I thought that I would investigate further by moving some of the contents, that's when I found the droppings not mouse droppings but rat, this meant that I had to empty the garage and discovered more evidence of the problem, the more I removed the less hiding places the rat had, I could hear it moving so armed with a pick axe handle I delved further, I had shut the door as I didn't want it escaping that way so it was me and the rat locked in a confined space just like I'm a celeb, I found a bag of rat poison which had been in there for at least ten years had been eaten so thought that the rat would be half dead and that the odds were in my favour, making as much noise as I could and banging the pick handle on the concrete floor the rat broke cover up the shelving and out through a hole in the top corner of the back wall, O.M.G it wasn't a pet rat size it was a full grown farmyard size rat. At the moment I'm filling the holes around the tops of the walls with wood and wire mesh while moving everything and disinfecting, I haven't seen a nest. The rat is in the garden somewhere once the garage is rat proof I will have to start looking for it.
Coooo that was tense @barry island. Expanding foam is good for larger holes and can be trimmed to tidy. It's also important to have at least a bit of ventilation.
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I've removed the food temporarily from the bird table but we retained the window feeders. I have also bought a bait station so hopefully that will move them on/eradicate the problem!
I have feeders where I am now and goldfinches but so far no problem as the many doves & pigeons clean up every day, fingers crossed ….. the pigeon poo is not nice but beats having resident rats !
I should add that I only ever use sunflower hearts, nuts and suet balls just attract squirrels and magpies in my experience
A couple of weeks ago I noticed a funky smell in the garage and thought either a mouse had got in and died or maybe a carrot had been left in the sand storage box and had rotted, as the garage had become something of a tip with stuff just thrown in I didn't investigate further, the other day I noticed that the bag the fish food was in had been nibbled so assuming mice I bought some traps and set them around the floor, the next day the traps were empty so I thought that I would investigate further by moving some of the contents, that's when I found the droppings not mouse droppings but rat, this meant that I had to empty the garage and discovered more evidence of the problem, the more I removed the less hiding places the rat had, I could hear it moving so armed with a pick axe handle I delved further, I had shut the door as I didn't want it escaping that way so it was me and the rat locked in a confined space just like I'm a celeb, I found a bag of rat poison which had been in there for at least ten years had been eaten so thought that the rat would be half dead and that the odds were in my favour, making as much noise as I could and banging the pick handle on the concrete floor the rat broke cover up the shelving and out through a hole in the top corner of the back wall, O.M.G it wasn't a pet rat size it was a full grown farmyard size rat. At the moment I'm filling the holes around the tops of the walls with wood and wire mesh while moving everything and disinfecting, I haven't seen a nest. The rat is in the garden somewhere once the garage is rat proof I will have to start looking for it.
Expanding foam is good for larger holes and can be trimmed to tidy. It's also important to have at least a bit of ventilation.
Gardening in Central Norfolk on improved gritty moraine over chalk ... free-draining.