Comments on: rats!

By: Cyn

Cyn — Mon, 07 Nov 2011 13:42:58 +0000

My partner owns a pest control business in FL, where rats are part of the wild life. You CAN safely poison rats without poisoning your pets, official or unofficial, as long as the law is followed. It’s easier to get a decent exterminator to do it for you, though. Rodent Bait Boxes are strong enough to drive a car over, are locked so even you can’t get into it if you tried, and are securely staked so they cannot be moved easily. The amount of bait it takes to kill a rat will not kill a cat if it eats it, but cats don’t eat dead anyway. I’ve had a rat box in my yard for years. My cats are outdoor cats, my dogs pee on it, no one has ever become ill. Following the law is where it’s at.

By: Klarissa

Klarissa — Thu, 13 Oct 2011 00:05:05 +0000

I wouldn’t try to put any kind of poison out, I would let Mama Cass and her baby take care of them. Trust me that they will do a better job of ridding the area of the rats and will be fed in the process. I know that is one thing I love about having cats.

By: Mrs. M

Mrs. M — Tue, 11 Oct 2011 16:48:39 +0000

Ewww! I once worked at a store near a shipyard and the area was infested with “marine” rats… no joke, these rats were the size of large cats. *shudder*

By: ProjectGirl

ProjectGirl — Tue, 11 Oct 2011 16:29:02 +0000

Shortly after I bought my house and moved in, my next door neighbor told me of her “adventures” with TREE RATS when she moved in. She also had them in her trees AND her attic. I hadn’t even heard of tree rats… and hoped to never learn about them. She eventually prevailed — I don’t know her method.

But — I later had DFW Wildlife* out to my house for eastern sparrows who had made a cozy home INSIDE an exterior wall of my house, between the studs. I could literally hear chirping in my walls — aside from being unnerved by it and being worried about the birds, it drove my dog mad. As a perk of their visit, they did an exterior perimeter walk of my house and gave me advice for keeping critters out. I’ll share:

1) Ivy growing up your house was referred to as a “Rodent Highway.” The critters are covered by the ivy, therefore feel safe from predators, as they are traveling from the ground to whatever attic opening they can find. I don’t care how asthetically pleasing the ivy on my house was, it came down the next day. All of it. Rodent Highway? That’s motivation in my book.

2) He told me to get steel wool and poke it up into every crevice between the wood “apron” under my eaves and my brick. He advised as how critters can make themselves amazingly tiny to wiggle in, but that they don’t like steel wool. Very soon after I was on a ladder, with a wad of steel wood and a chopstick, shoving that stuff up into every crevice. It didn’t take as long as I expected it to… but it could have taken all weekend and I probably still would have done it.

3) Look around your eaves for the one or two PVC pipes that are sticking out. Cover the ends. Take a piece of metal screen, form it over the end of the pipe, and affix with a ring clamp.

So far, I’ve been critter free…

* They are a humane animal control service. $75 gets them out to your house within hours of your call, and you have a 1 year guarantee against the same issue arising again. They. Were. Fab. They do every type of critter you can enountaer in the area. And they freely dispense information about, for example, what happens if my dog corners a raccoon or a possum? (The dog will win.) Priceless I tell you.

By: Cora

Cora — Tue, 11 Oct 2011 06:37:42 +0000

Usually, if you have cats, rats will not come into your house: just the smell of the cats is enough to keep them away.
And catching them will rarely solve the problem, since rats can breed very quick (too much info?). To get rid of them, you need to exterminate all of them, or make their home unsuitable (aka clean and neat), so they will vacate.
Keeping Mama nearby will keep them at a distance.