Rats .22 rifle, quick and the best way for the rat to go. I'm glad to say I've only had to shoot one in the last 12 months. If I hadn't though, by now we would have a family of them.
I purposely drop half the bird food on the floor for ground feeders. If you have a rat already, it will find it. Make sure it is safe for the shot (no chance of the pellet leaving the garden or ricochets causing damage). Do the business, get on with life.
I properly hate doing it but rats are not good for me, the family or the neighbour's. Having a compost heap in a rural area it is inevitable that they will need controlling at some point, so I take it as my responsibility to do it.
naphthalene is indeed extremely poisonous in its undiluted form. I use to work with the stuff it came in specially sealed drums and was stored and handled in a negative air pressure room and we had to wear special suites and breathing apparatus to enter the room.
If you have a garden and a library, you have everything you need.
I use a Belgian product called ToxaOverdose. It is sachets of blue grain pellets soaked in poison which kill the rats and other rodents quite quickly and then dessicates the corpses so you don't get the dreadful smell of decomposing bodies. It is faster than the ones containing warfarin that make them bleed to death over a few days.
Our house is an old farmhouse surrounded by arable fields and pasture so rodents are a permanent feature in the garden and they migrate into the house and barn and attic and garage in winter so out come the sachets. They've also been eating my pots and troughs of bulbs in the greenhouse this year.
I have a mousing cat and two dogs, one of whom is an excellent ratter but they can't get them all so I slide the sachets under and behind furniture and the stuff in the attic and garage so our pets are safe.
Vendée - 20kms from Atlantic coast.
"The price good men (and women) pay for indifference to public affairs is to be ruled by evil men (and women)."
however - mint does work! I do have mint planted all around the edges of my garden and I haven't had problems with rats or mice. ...
That is not proof - we don't have mint all around the edges of our garden, but we have painted our fence Seagrass green and we've not had any problems with rats or mice since then - is that evidence that Seagrass green fences deter rats? Of course not.
And rivers, streams and ditches are frequently full of growing mint all along the banks ............... and frequented by rats ............ mint does not deter rats.
At a factory in Norwich large quantities of Mint Sauce and Mint Jelly are made - if your theory worked they would not need to take any action to keep rats away would they? But of course they do.
Gardening in Central Norfolk on improved gritty moraine over chalk ... free-draining.
As for not having plants growing too close to buildings - yes, rats can access roof spaces etc by climbing up walls covered with creepers etc
However a member of my farming family stores tonnes of potatoes in modern concrete walled buildings without any grass, bushes, shrubs or similar withing 25 metres minimum - but he has to use bait stations to deal with rats as they still attempt to access the stores because they simply love potatoes - they will gnaw through cement to get at potatoes.
Gardening in Central Norfolk on improved gritty moraine over chalk ... free-draining.
If mint worked it would have been used commercially years ago. I've got both water mint and ordinary mint in the garden, which has loads of small mammals living it. I was watching a wood mouse on one of my wildlife cams last night, and a big hairy spider, glad it was out there and not near me lol.
If you are going to kill a rat you might as well shoot it and kill it straight away rather then poison it and let it suffer. I am sure you or someone you know must have a gun.
That could waste a lot of time sitting around waiting for them, not to mention all the bovver of getting a gun permit. The poison I use does the job quickly and without further effort or time form me apart form bunging any corpses in teh bin.
Now I just need to find a way to stop all the meeces from migrating into our attic via the rather too porous brick walls this old farm is built from. Any sensible suggestions gratefully received as they've been more than usually numerous and persistent this year.
Vendée - 20kms from Atlantic coast.
"The price good men (and women) pay for indifference to public affairs is to be ruled by evil men (and women)."
You don't need a gun permit in the UK for a .22 which is ideal and more than adequate for dispatching rats.
In your situation obelixx an infra red night sight would be essential. It is the only way you would deal with rats effectively in a rambling old house and outbuildings. The professionals use both bait and night sighted air rifles to make a serious impact on rat populations.
I have only just discovered these pests and I am really worried. I know they are under our decking in the Pergola, but worse still I think they may get into my Grandson's play house, right next to the Pergola. I love animals and I am soft to fault but these creatures I will destroy to the best of my ability. I think I will get professional help in. We also have Guinea pigs and I am afraid to put them out on the lawn in their run. mainly because I saw a large rat saunter across the lawn only today.
Posts
Rats .22 rifle, quick and the best way for the rat to go. I'm glad to say I've only had to shoot one in the last 12 months. If I hadn't though, by now we would have a family of them.
I purposely drop half the bird food on the floor for ground feeders. If you have a rat already, it will find it. Make sure it is safe for the shot (no chance of the pellet leaving the garden or ricochets causing damage). Do the business, get on with life.
I properly hate doing it but rats are not good for me, the family or the neighbour's. Having a compost heap in a rural area it is inevitable that they will need controlling at some point, so I take it as my responsibility to do it.
naphthalene is indeed extremely poisonous in its undiluted form. I use to work with the stuff it came in specially sealed drums and was stored and handled in a negative air pressure room and we had to wear special suites and breathing apparatus to enter the room.
I use a Belgian product called ToxaOverdose. It is sachets of blue grain pellets soaked in poison which kill the rats and other rodents quite quickly and then dessicates the corpses so you don't get the dreadful smell of decomposing bodies. It is faster than the ones containing warfarin that make them bleed to death over a few days.
Our house is an old farmhouse surrounded by arable fields and pasture so rodents are a permanent feature in the garden and they migrate into the house and barn and attic and garage in winter so out come the sachets. They've also been eating my pots and troughs of bulbs in the greenhouse this year.
I have a mousing cat and two dogs, one of whom is an excellent ratter but they can't get them all so I slide the sachets under and behind furniture and the stuff in the attic and garage so our pets are safe.
Not upset Minxy - just ever so slightly fed up with people criticising others when they don't know what they're talking about
That is not proof - we don't have mint all around the edges of our garden, but we have painted our fence Seagrass green and we've not had any problems with rats or mice since then - is that evidence that Seagrass green fences deter rats? Of course not.
And rivers, streams and ditches are frequently full of growing mint all along the banks ............... and frequented by rats ............ mint does not deter rats.
At a factory in Norwich large quantities of Mint Sauce and Mint Jelly are made - if your theory worked they would not need to take any action to keep rats away would they? But of course they do.
Gardening in Central Norfolk on improved gritty moraine over chalk ... free-draining.
As for not having plants growing too close to buildings - yes, rats can access roof spaces etc by climbing up walls covered with creepers etc
However a member of my farming family stores tonnes of potatoes in modern concrete walled buildings without any grass, bushes, shrubs or similar withing 25 metres minimum - but he has to use bait stations to deal with rats as they still attempt to access the stores because they simply love potatoes - they will gnaw through cement to get at potatoes.
Gardening in Central Norfolk on improved gritty moraine over chalk ... free-draining.
If mint worked it would have been used commercially years ago. I've got both water mint and ordinary mint in the garden, which has loads of small mammals living it. I was watching a wood mouse on one of my wildlife cams last night, and a big hairy spider, glad it was out there and not near me lol.
If you are going to kill a rat you might as well shoot it and kill it straight away rather then poison it and let it suffer. I am sure you or someone you know must have a gun.
That could waste a lot of time sitting around waiting for them, not to mention all the bovver of getting a gun permit. The poison I use does the job quickly and without further effort or time form me apart form bunging any corpses in teh bin.
Now I just need to find a way to stop all the meeces from migrating into our attic via the rather too porous brick walls this old farm is built from. Any sensible suggestions gratefully received as they've been more than usually numerous and persistent this year.
You don't need a gun permit in the UK for a .22 which is ideal and more than adequate for dispatching rats.
In your situation obelixx an infra red night sight would be essential. It is the only way you would deal with rats effectively in a rambling old house and outbuildings. The professionals use both bait and night sighted air rifles to make a serious impact on rat populations.
I have only just discovered these pests and I am really worried. I know they are under our decking in the Pergola, but worse still I think they may get into my Grandson's play house, right next to the Pergola. I love animals and I am soft to fault but these creatures I will destroy to the best of my ability. I think I will get professional help in. We also have Guinea pigs and I am afraid to put them out on the lawn in their run. mainly because I saw a large rat saunter across the lawn only today.
Jpop, Devon