At least where you live you can park something nice outside over winter. Here you would be digging it out with a snow shovel
I know that this remedy has been disputed, but Bounce fabric softener sheets, lots of them, have worked miracles for me. Distribute them liberally around the interior and no more pests. Just my 2 cents worth.
There’s a big dilemma that occurs when you get to the point of having more cars than garage space… That’s when you have to determine which vehicles go outside and what gets to live in the nice, warm garage. I’ve currently got four old cars and a two-car garage, so you can see where this is heading. My wife says "you lied to me when you said I could park my Impala in the new shop". She's wrong, I let her park in it for a month.
best thing I saw was on here... a five gallon pail filled with water and anti freeze Drill a hole near the top and put a wood dowel across the top with aluminum can through the middle of the dowel... coat the can with peanut butter and put a wood plank up to the top of the bucket, smear peanut butter on the plank, and when they climb up the plank they will see the can and jump on it, it will swivel and they will drop in the water antifreeze mix, which should be low enough that they cannot climb out...drink a beer and watch them drown
Don't know about the cedar, it's used for pets, but the peppermint oil is the real deal. If you use the bars of poison, be sure to fasten or wire them down. otherwise the rats just carry them off and stash them. My dad went through three or four boxes of them, thinking he was killing all the rats in Texas. Then he looked under the seats. Still had the three or four boxes of rat poison.
I have this problem 3 motorcycles and 3 cars. The 50 Merc is at a friends house uncovered. I also have a post war complete Ford chassis in the weather in my yard.
My problem is usually wasps (mud daubers here in GA)- little buggers find every nook an cranny to build a nest, and most times you don't know until you invaded "their" space!
Been there and done that but not with as nice a car as your Merc and we have a little worse weather here.I have a five car garage and still have a Model A in the driveway after selling a car and a motorcycle. I've never had a problem with rats here but use the pickup as a daily driver, was driving it last week when it was 4 degrees and a little snow on the ground.Hopefully it will be in the garage by next winter, set the body on the frame on my V8 A yesterday and can start putting it together and clear out a stall for the pickup.
I set conventional mouse traps and the bucket traps up in my garage. When I get one I throw it out back for the critters to snack on. I also have a healthy population of hawks, owls, coyotes, etc that keeps them at bay. Have yet to find any evidence of rodents in my cars.
The video I saw showing this trap had the ramp board 90* from where yours is placed. The rodents could more easily access the can/peanut butter but immediately fell into bucket when the can rotated. You setup may work, but it seems quite a distance for a mouse to jump. Ray
Come on Ray, think !!! cut a notch in the bucket and slide the board closer to the bait..soon as they touch it it spins, and down they go.. more fun then watching chrome rust...
Seems like I have had this issue all my life.....I bought an enclosed car trailer and that is where my Willys is living for the winter...I used the Bounce dryer sheets too, it works as far as I am concerned ---- great thing about the enclosed trailer is you don't pay property tax on it, you can move it around, and becomes a valuable tool for restoration or bringing a car to the digs.
Jay, why should you be different from the rest of us proles? Been juggling this problem for decades. Please, just don't tell me you have a modern car in that garage. Keep the German thing outside!
two four post lifts convert a two car garage into a four car garage.......and the rats have to work harder to get at the top two.
Another twist or two on the bucket trap. All you really need is the 5 gal bucket a small block of wood and the ramp. Put the peanut butter on the block of wood. float it an inch or two of water. Once they jump in there is no way for them to jump once they're in the water. Option two is put an inch or two of molasses in the bucket with the ramp and you're done. This is better for long term because the molasses actually dissolves the mice so you just dump a bucket of sludge in the spring and nothing is toxic.
I don't mean to be an ass, but it would seem to me if you could afford 4 nice cars like that, you should be able to afford the rent for nice indoor storage. After all no one wants a rat rod.
not my set up I just googled rat bucket can and that was one of the images....just for a visual.. I get field mice and use snap traps
The problem I have with peppermint oil is that I can't stand it either. Makes my stomach turn to smell it more than a few minutes at a time.
That Merc looks awfully nice to sit outside. I'd love to give you shit for it but this has been a problem for me for a long time as well. I have 3 cars in a 2 car garage which my work van/winter beater has never been inside of, I have a 24x36 with 4 cars in it which if I really worked at it I could get a 5th in there but then there'd be no room to do any work or even walk, and I still have shit outside. This after selling off a ton of cars and projects and buying a couple of semi trailers to park in the lot to keep loose parts and stuff in. A couple more cars need to get sold off this spring and a friend of mine with some huge buildings is hopefully going to let me store a couple in there which will help. I really do not want to become the guy with some once-nice cars sitting outside under shredded covers who's "gonna finish that up soon" when really every day it gets worse. That attitude used to mystify me, but now I'm starting to see how easily that kind of thing can happen.
My neighbor was doing the bucket thing for squirrels..One bucket filled with water to about 2" from top with bird seed spread on water..board up the side..I told him I thought it wasn't humane...DBC is the way to go...
I use peppermint oil. With success. Buy it at your local drugs store I got by bottle at rite aid in the oils/vitamins department. Get a tea bag and saturate it with peppermint oil and place that where you don't want rats and vermin getting to. The oil smells good but strong and will open up your sense, I guess mice and rats hate the stuff. And use a brillo pad when covering a hole they chewed through, they can't stand that stuff either. Since I've went this route I haven't had a rat. And they're out there, just not messing with my stuff. Sent from my SM-J727T1 using The H.A.M.B. mobile app
I heard blood meal works real good...you don't even have to pickup dead ones...the rodents just beg off completely.
I had this problem, so I gritted my teeth and sold an el Camino and two Firetrucks. Wonder of wonders, it didn't kill me!
The 5 gallon bucket trap works. I have has a plastic pop bottle that spins on a piece of welding rod. Coated with peanut butter and a way for mice to get to it easy it does a number on them. I caught over 20 in a 2 day period in the cellar here in the house. The cat and dogs catch mice around the place so I don't set poison out. I don't put antifreeze in the bucket, there is no need to, about 5 inches of water and the little buggers drown quick. I dump them out in the field for other critters to eat so I don't want anything poison in the bucket.
I just gave up and gave them the penthouse in Trump Plaza , A.K.A. the glove box in my 36 shop truck.
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