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+--- Thread: Rat in my kitchen (/showthread.php?tid=759)
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Rat in my kitchen - Haggis Killer - 05-02-2007
Imagine my surprise when I opened up the cabinet under my sink to toss in some trash only to find a juvenile dusky footed wood rat chewing on my garbage.
Both of us startled, the trash can falls over and the rat makes a beeline for... you guessed it... the dining room. He runs under the china hutch. Luckily for me, it's kind of a trap for him. Still stunned, I manage to close the pocket door from the dining room to the kitchen, shutting off one exit. Now he's got to get by me to get into the living room and points east. I pick up a plastic container. Too small. I pick up a kid size shoe box. Also too small. The rat makes a run along the base of the wall opposite me, hits the corner, comes down the other wall and runs into some pictures leaning against the wall. I scare him back. He's back under the hutch, watching me. I dump a bunch of old tea cannisters out of a cardboard box lid. (Aside: it's handy when rats get into your house that you're not that great of a housekeeper and there happens to be a lot of crap to get your hands on when you need something with which to capture a rodent stat. End aside.) Rat is getting nervous. He goes back along the far wall. I lose sight of him behind a table leg. Where did he go? Aaaah! He's climbing on the furniture! This won't do. I start pulling chairs away from the table and putting them behind me. Too much in the way. (Another aside: I'm crouched down on all fours, staying at rat level. Every muscle in my body is tensed up, ready to move in any direction. I feel like a potential college draft pick at the combine but I haven't been working out and am not familiar with the drills that I'm doing. My heart is pounding. I'm starting to sweat. End another aside.) I start banging on the chair he's on the top of. He leaps from the chair over to the wooden window shutters. Hah! My chance! I grab the lid and lunge (literally) forward, lid first. I trap him under the lid against the shutters. The lid presses down on the shutter lever, making it impossible for the rat to slip through and onto the window sill. I wedge a chair back against the lid tightly. I run to the garage and find a thin board I can slide in between the lid and shutters. I find a large plastic bin with a tight fitting lid. I run the bin outside to the patio. I run back to the dining room with the thin board. I tap the box lid and hear scrambling. He's still caught. I brace the box lid with one hand and start sliding the board down with the other. Pressure. Keep it tight. Just as I get the board to the bottom, I hear squealing. I've caught his foot between the lid and the board. I shake the lid a bit and free his foot. He's now trapped inside the box lid. Pressure. Tight. I take it outside and dump the lid into the plastic bin and slap the lid on.
Got him.
Now what? I've trapped a live rat.
I leave him there to go figure out how he got in. I realize there are some small (but not small enough) gaps in the hole cut around the drain pipe from my sink. I get some steel wool and wire and fashion a plug. Seems to work.
The rat is in a bin on my back porch. Benzilla goes out back to watch the rat and eat a popsicle.
I go back to look under the sink. I hear scratching.
He's got friends.
I have two rat traps. There is a crawl space under my house, so I could go under there and set traps near the sink area. One problem, though: I HAVE RATS UNDER MY HOUSE. I plug in a 'rat be-gone' audio rodent deterrent under the sink and set the two rat traps in the crawlspace under my house. Near the door. But close to the walls where rats like to creep around. Bait used: bread with olive oil.
10pm last night: I drove the captive rat up to the park near my house and turn him loose. He's a tree rat. The park has trees. I shouldn't see him again. I also won't see two of his siblings again, because both my crawlspace traps got hits last night. I've put two more traps in there. Bait used: bread with peanut oil. (Change of diet; they should have some variety, no?)
I'll check them in the morning.
Here's what I've learned:
- I am NEVER going under my house again.
- I am in crappy shape.
- I do not want a rodent for a pet.
- I cannot kill a rat with my bare hands.
Hmmm - Greg_phpbb3_import1 - 05-03-2007
Still no response from the Queen. I thought there would be one here before now.
Two more - Haggis Killer - 05-03-2007
Yesterday's traps got two more. That's five rats in two days.
The thing is, I won't use poison. I did once. Later that year, I had to crawl under the house. I found close to ten dessicated rat carcasses in the dirt. They were really hard to spot. Not to mention, they stink up the house after the poison kills them. Wherever they are when they die. No predicting.
With the traps, they're right there to take away. Like it or not. Humane? No. But then, THEY'RE RATS.
You mean your friends in the "garage"? - The Queen - 05-03-2007
I don't do rats.
Period.
That's one the important reasons I have a big strong man in my life, to take care of things like rats.
And I'm very glad that I never saw the one you told me about in our kitchen.
- El Dingo - 05-04-2007
We had rats as pets. They are incredibly affectionate, much more than hamsters or mice.
We use 'humane' traps that catch the critters so I can bring them to work and release them near the estuary.
- Dr. Ivor Yeti - 05-05-2007
Question #1: Mz. Queen, does G-Man know you have a big strong man around for "rat-duty"?
Question #2: HK, maybe you can get ED to come and spend a week or so at your house with his Humane Traps
Statement: I had a long-running mouse insurgency in my kitchen. My cruel campaign currently has them cowed. When I was purchasing traps from my local Pinoy Market, I realized that other cultures have different slants on the pest problem. The trap I got was good for removing such pests as mice, rats, and...cobras.
Cobras.
My mouse problem was put in perspective. They died anyway, but they died in perspective. And that's important.
Well... - Haggis Killer - 05-05-2007
I don't think anyone would really enjoy living under my house, even for a week. That's where the rats live. It's dirty & smelly down there. What I really need is a pied piper to just make them not want to live here anymore. Anyone? Greg?
Two more this morning. That brings the total up to 7.
(Official scoring: 6 deceased, 1 catch/release)
You could try this... - The Queen - 05-06-2007
<!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="http://www.critter-repellent.com/rat/rat-control.php">http://www.critter-repellent.com/rat/rat-control.php</a><!-- m -->
hook, line and sinker - cranefly - 05-07-2007
All right you guys and guyesses. You set me up, didn't you.
You totally set me up. Admit it.
This morning I'm in my room pounding away on my keyboard. Suddenly there's a crash. An undefined crash. It seems to be coming from the kitchen. I get up, walk into the living room, and from there I can see Geek and Pancake (two of our cats) standing in the kitchen looking off to the side, appearing rather puzzled. They're looking in the direction of their food and water bowls.
I take a step towards the kitchen, and suddenly something large steps into view. Geek and Pancake step aside, still puzzled but now a bit hissy, as this huge raccoon looks at me, then lumbers out the open kitchen door.
Our yard is fenced, by the way. Not very well. I've added a downward-facing U-shaped strip of wire mesh along the top of the fence to keep our cats in. It has worked marvelously. Now it works marvelously at befuddling the raccoon, who tears up a couple of my Kentucky Wonder bean seedlings making attempts to leap out. Then he's up the tangerine tree and over the fence and away.
Will he be back? I worry. He got a taste of cat food. He knows where I live.
Borrowing from Jaws, I'm gonna need a bigger trap.
--cranefly
Oooh! - Haggis Killer - 05-07-2007
Racoons LOVE cat food! He (or She) is sure to be back. I probably don't need to mention this, but don't mess with him (or her). Racoons are basically fearless. Not to mention the whole thumb thing. Don't put any loaded guns on the floor where they can be got at.
Gotcha - cranefly - 05-07-2007
I heard about a woman who loved raccoons. She would put food out for them in her backyard. One day a friend stopped by and saw that she had a big bandage on her nose. It turns out that she decided to go out on the back porch and feed them by hand. One of them leaped at her face and bit off the tip of her nose.
Still, she likes raccoons. The last I heard, she was still feeding them -- though with a bit more caution.
As for me, I'm on top of things.
I just placed two large rat traps with hair triggers in front of the cat food and water bowls in the kitchen.
If that raccoon comes around again, he/she will get a lesson he won't soon remember -- because he'll/she'll be dead!
Lousy no-good amphibian.
No, wait. They're mammals. Right?
--cranefly
- Dr. Ivor Yeti - 05-19-2007
Catch any cats, yet?
Oh, yeah, the cats - cranefly - 05-19-2007
Many times.
I keep pulling them out of the traps, bandaging their paws, and telling them to use the special food and water bowls hidden in a closet in the very back corner of the bedroom (furthest from the open kitchen door).
You think they'll listen? Noooo. About every fifteen minutes I hear a loud SNAP coming from the kitchen followed by a yeow.
But it's working. Because all their yeowling is keeping the raccoon at a distance.
Though Lady Cranefly is not impressed. She can be so cynical.
She made me take down my Mission Accomplished banner.
--cranefly
- Dr. Ivor Yeti - 05-19-2007
OK, I don't laugh out loud very often (the smirk is my preferred method of communicating amusement) but that last post had me chuckling away here at work. Well done, CF!
Some people just don't like rodents - cranefly - 06-24-2007
http://unix.rulez.org/~calver/video/typical_chick.wmv