if you don't anchor the sticky traps to something HEAVY, the rat will flip around and you will have blood, hair, sticky stuff everywhere. Nail the sticky traps to a 2x6, needs to be 2-3x heavier than the rat.
Rodent proofing!!! You have to find out how they are getting in the building in the first place. And they only need a 1/4 inch gap or more to get in.Check door gaps, pipes going into the wall -and even the roof. Seal up the openings first then the traps and or glue boards.
As Andy said a barn cat. The bubonic plague was spread because of man's extermination of cats. A good mouser is worth a lot. We have cats, the only problem is the best mouser, a Tom, does kill chipmonks and rabbits, but mainly mice, rats and moles. The housecat, a Siamese, is a fair mouser and has killed a couple small snakes. Doesn't claw furniture. Our veterinarian says people are much more likely to spread illness to a cat or dog than it can spread to it's owner. Cats are great pets. Sent from my SM-S320VL using Tapatalk
My grandmother lived in an old farmhouse and used to put a dish of cola out. The mice loved it but they couldn't pass the gas from it and that's what would will kill them. Too bad that doesn't work on some a##holes I know.
No matter how well you seal your garage or house, mice can get in. Many years ago I was working on a tube type television chassis on the work bench of an appliance store I worked for. (RCA CTC138). We had test jigs with cables (basically a picture tube, yoke, speaker). This set the complaint was a loud arcing sound. This set had a metal high voltage cage, about half shoebox size that had hv transformer and rectifier tube that produced 25 kV. Turned set on, tubes warmed up then snap, crackle,pop! When I lifted hv cage cover, there was a mouse stretched straight out, lightning coming off top of his head! An appliance repairman found a mouse inside a Maytag washing machine timer. You could hardly push a pencil in either one...yet a there was dead mouse. Sent from my SM-S320VL using Tapatalk
Its stated a rat can get into a hole the size of a quarter. They can also enter thru the commode. I have a 55 gallon barrel set net to the wall in my feed room. water in the bottom and grain floating in the bottom. Used to find drowned rats & mice very often. Since I put out that one bite poison. I haven't had any.
Agreed most aint native. My wife ancestors where here before white men. White men brought the rats. They where on sailing ships. Invasive species are quite often determental to in native birds and other animals. Song birds are in decline. its rare to see a quail in the Ozarks. Im trying to do my part. My fence rows are overgrown. Ive been planting Osage orange , Hawthorn and False orange in the fence rows. I want a 6 ft thick thorny hedge row. I trap furbearing critters that are varmits that eat rabbits and birds. Just my opinion but a free roaming house cat is a varmit. I will not tolerate them on my land. I seen on twenty twenty. A college girl shared a dorm with a cat lover. the cat owner was apparently resistant. However the new dorm mate caught Menningitis from the cat, almost died and lost both arms & legs.
Amazing ! Ain't no cats allowed at my place. When my son was little, a cat scratched him. Didn't think anything about it, but a few weeks later he developed some hard places in his groin. Spent a week in the hospital with 10 doctors trying to figure out what was wrong. Suspected lukemia. Then one day a doctor asked if he had ever been scratched by a cat. Most/All cats carry a bacteria on their claws and they can cause all kinds of health issues and you may never know its from a cat scratch. Nope, no cats here....and I liked them before that happened.
I do the same when needed but I bait they trap for a couple of nights for them to get used to it. Third night bait and set trap and bye bye. Don't use sticky traps as that's just cruel and then you have to kill them anyway. They haven't invented anything better.
Cat Scratch Fever ain't just a Ted Nugent tune, it's real nasty stuff. I had an aunt who got scratched on her arm and it kind of paralyzed her hand.
Who knows. That was a lot of dogs. Lot's of mouser cats would perform well also. Cats are quicker, have "fish hook" like claws and have saliva that when bitten makes the prey sick. Also see in almost dark conditions. Those dogs did great! As a kid (1930s) my Dad had a rat terrier "Spike". Dad said all neighbors had to do was yell "get him Spike" if they ever saw a mouse or rat. Sent from my SM-S320VL using Tapatalk
Rats and toilets!!!!! Before I retired I worked out of a building in the city. I used bathroom...then went back a few minutes later, bathroom stuff thrown around! I couldn't figure out what the (bleep) happened! Then I heard hissing, like a snake. Then I saw a rat tail behind commode. I slammed door, then (thinking I was a genius ) I made a hallway out of sheets of plywood going bath door to walk out door. I thought now all I have to do was get behind it with a broom, get it to go out. That rat tore the broom up!!!!! So I closed door, got a spring rat trap, peanut butter. Set in bath. Came back a couple hours later, trap got it. Big dam sewer rat. I always wondered what if rat came up just a few minutes earlier as I was on the pot?!? He would have climbed the rope! I would of had heart failure. I called city, they sent a guy out with rat poison. He couldn't find sewer cover...I said why not simply flush poison down toilets? Which we did. I still have nightmares... Sent from my SM-S320VL using Tapatalk
I few years ago I was taking around 2 mice a day out of my shop all winter long. Common traps with peanut butter bait. Not a day went by that I didn't take at least 1 dead mouse out of there, some days 4 or 5 and I only saw one running around twice. Had 6 traps set around the building. Most of the mice were in the trap by the main walk in door or under my roller cabinet in the middle room of 3. This little girl moved into our neighborhood and the first winter I noticed none of the traps in my shop had anything in them, all winter long, perfectly clear. Took her in, got her fixed and she's a killing machine. She eats a bunny a day with either a mouse, bird or mole chaser. Last winter she broke both bones in her front leg and was missing 4 days (trying to get back home we assume, she could only walk 4 or 5 steps and had to lie down and rest). As soon as the cast was off she was back to work and the mice stopped again. She earns her keep easily. SPark
have not had a mouse problem since I got Chaz. the first month here he had the bodies stacked up like cord wood.
I had a serious mouse problem in my house, (I set 8 mouse traps one night and got 8 mice!) stopped by the local spca that weekend and hired two mouse executioners. I feed them, make sure they have clean water and liter box. They make sure no rodents enter the house. Cheep insurance. Sent from my iPhone using H.A.M.B.
Peppermint oil repels them. If you use the bars, be sure to fasten them down. The mice and certainly the rats will carry them off and hoard them.
My Sis in law called the house one day hysterical, she had something on a sticky trap under her kitchen sink and wanted me to come get it out. Went down there, opened the cabinet doors, there lay a dead yellow tailed copperhead ! About a foot long, it had come up beside the drain pipe I guess, got on the sticky trap and died. Told her to get Bro in law to fix the damn hole!
My cousins always had cats. a couple of then had meningitis. They always where getting scratched and where always at the doctor . Ok when I was about seven we had a neighbor who was a pigeon fancier. had racing homing pigeons that he could trace their linage back to messenger pigeons in the world war. his son was probably about twenty. I liked to watch the pigeons strut and peck around on the ground. One day a cat was stalking the pigeons. His son Dickie came out with a bow & arrow and killed that cat with one shot. So I wanted a bow and arrow. Pestered my folks until I got one. Little wooden bow arrows with plastic fletching . and a suction cup in the end. Well I took off the suction cup. sharpened the arrow. Actually my older brother took them to school and used the pencil sharpener. I got a box crate like they put produce in with slatted sides. propped it up with a stich and a long string. baited it with a bowl of milk. and trapped a cat. And being the heartless little urchin I was. I proceeded to bounce my arrows off the poor trapped feline. The neighbor walked over and asked Watcha Doing Randy Ben? I replied in trying to kill this pigeon killing cat. He just laughed and shrugged his shoulders and left. I finally gave up and went and g t Dickie. He said turn it loose and he shot it on the run.The picture is me with a tarripin turtle adout the same time. the ford behind me had dual carbs and aluminum heads on a 53 merc engine & overdrive trans.