Rat or Bloody Big Mouse?!

Al1944

Al1944

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Looks to be about 8 inches long including tail.
 

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Rat. We used to get loads In the garden. Until I bought an air rifle.

Try not to scatter bird food on the floor. That’s guaranteed to attract them in.
 
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Thought it was - but wanted to make sure before I dispose of it. There's a bird feeder on the fence above the spot where the pic was taken.

Would love to get an air rifle but unfortunately wife not keen, so it's got to be another way.
 
We didn’t want to use poison incase one of the dogs found one and decided to have some lunch.

Air rifle was swift and humane. Neither of us wanted to shoot them, but when a party of 10 are enjoying themselves on your patio, something had to be done.
 
Al1944 said:
Thought it was - but wanted to make sure before I dispose of it. There's a bird feeder on the fence above the spot where the pic was taken.

Would love to get an air rifle but unfortunately wife not keen, so it's got to be another way.
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If you are a good shot then an air rifle will be, as said above, swift and humane. But if that is not then you could try one of these - https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/EASY-SET...CTOR-BOX-GREEN-PET-SAFE-CONTROL-/132334208230

It needs to be placed carefully to stop smaller animals(eg hedgehog/squirrel) getting in, or foxes or cats putting their feet in.

Although the trap is effective adult rats seem to be very wary. A few months ago we noticed rats in the garden and using one of the above traps we caught seven, but all of them were youngster; not one adult.

Dave
 
Rats are very.. very clever. After shooting two or three, they changed their behaviour and changed the route they had always used to the feeder. There is a small brick wall (there bricks high, so tiny) that holds the gravel of the driveway off the patio and about 2 foot of soil with trees and plants in before the patio. They used to run the house side of the wall, so I could see them easily and use the brick wall as a backstop. They soon figured this out and started running the far side of the wall, where I couldnt see or shoot them. You’d see a head pop up every now and then, but that’s it. Theyd grab the food and dart back along the backside of the wall, whereas before they would just sit under the bird feeder, or on it and eat as much as they wanted.
All it took was two kills for them to change from carefree and brazen to being completely defensive. They’d even pop their heads back down as soon as they saw the barrel of the gun move towards them poking out of the dining room window.
 
Does your council have a pest control outfit ?

Killing one or two will not get rid of them.
Rats can breed all year round.
Five litters/year.
Gestation 21 days.
Young rats are sexually mature at 5 weeks.
A pair of rats can soon becomes hundreds.
Access to a food source (indoors and outdoors) is the source of the problem. A dead or wounded rat becomes more rat food.

A pest controller will suss out what needs to be done.
 
I killed 4-5 early this year, at one point we had 10 in the garden all at once.
Haven't seen one since.
Like I said, they are clever, they saw it was dangerous and moved on somewhere else.
 
That's a young rat.
There's no single, effective way of controlling them, partly because they learn quickly, partly because they breed even more quickly.

We have a small farm in North Yorkshire and have been told by pest controllers that the rat problem is worse this year than ever before. We use an air rifle in and around the barns (can't use a shotgun or cartridge rifle there because of the risk of damage and richochet) and also use both kill traps and poison, but the poison has to be sited very carefully because it's just as lethal to dogs. And due to a change in regulations, the poison currently available is nowhere near as effective as it used to be, but there's a workaround to this - buy it on Ebay from Northern Irish sellers, they're allowed better stuff there. Rats are always present but are much more numerous in cold weather, they seem to like their comfort..

A few years ago we were infested with rats on another piece of land, we had free range hens there and the rats completely took over, killing the chicks and even some of the hens, and became very bold due to their numbers. The females are constantly pregnant and perpetually hungry and at one point there were 11 rats eating from the chicken feeder at the same time, with a few hens cowering in a corner. I got 115 in one day with a shotgun, but gave up because I couldn't spend all my time doing it, and resorted to massive quantities of poison - I didn't want to do that because shooting is humane and poison isn't, but there was no choice, and after another week or so there were none left. That problem arose because my other half thought that it was OK to have a few rats around and didn't want them killed, basically she thought that they have as much right to life as we do - she now has a very different attitude:) - so learn from our mistake and deal with them before they take over!
 
Garry Edwards said:
That's a young rat.
There's no single, effective way of controlling them, partly because they learn quickly, partly because they breed even more quickly.

We have a small farm in North Yorkshire and have been told by pest controllers that the rat problem is worse this year than ever before. We use an air rifle in and around the barns (can't use a shotgun or cartridge rifle there because of the risk of damage and richochet) and also use both kill traps and poison, but the poison has to be sited very carefully because it's just as lethal to dogs. And due to a change in regulations, the poison currently available is nowhere near as effective as it used to be, but there's a workaround to this - buy it on Ebay from Northern Irish sellers, they're allowed better stuff there. Rats are always present but are much more numerous in cold weather, they seem to like their comfort..

A few years ago we were infested with rats on another piece of land, we had free range hens there and the rats completely took over, killing the chicks and even some of the hens, and became very bold due to their numbers. The females are constantly pregnant and perpetually hungry and at one point there were 11 rats eating from the chicken feeder at the same time, with a few hens cowering in a corner. I got 115 in one day with a shotgun, but gave up because I couldn't spend all my time doing it, and resorted to massive quantities of poison - I didn't want to do that because shooting is humane and poison isn't, but there was no choice, and after another week or so there were none left. That problem arose because my other half thought that it was OK to have a few rats around and didn't want them killed, basically she thought that they have as much right to life as we do - she now has a very different attitude:) - so learn from our mistake and deal with them before they take over!
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Being more numerous in cold weather is just perception I think. The food has gone from the fields where they have been breeding all summer and so they appear round farms/houses looking for food.
 
sphexx said:
Being more numerous in cold weather is just perception I think. The food has gone from the fields where they have been breeding all summer and so they appear round farms/houses looking for food.
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You may be right, @Cobra is our resident expert on this . . .
 
Garry Edwards said:
You may be right, @Cobra is our resident expert on this . . .
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I’m on the edge of farmland here so dog walking in the summer you can see the rat trails coming out of the cereal fields and into the hedgerows. Rats don’t hibernate so they have to travel into nearby gardens, farm buildings etc for food.
 
Our garden backs onto a large allotment garden and we have had occasional problems with rats over the years, more so since we started feeding birds in a big way. That pic was taken at the bottom of an old stone wall which separates us from our neighbour. Signs now that the rats have set up home in a section of garden which is about three feet higher than the bottom of the wall on our side. The little buggers have opened up a tunnel from next door, through the soft old mortar in the wall to gain access to the bird food on our side!

Used poison blocks for the past four days. They were disappearing extremely quickly but the last one put down has been there for two days so hope we'll be free of vermin for a while.

Whilst Googling for info came across this:

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/video/n...eo-man-blew-lawn-attempt-rid-cockroaches.html
 
Al1944 said:
OThe little buggers have opened up a tunnel from next door, through the soft old mortar in the wall to gain access to the bird food on our side!
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That iswhat they do from my neighbours to get under my shed without being in the open :(
 
Cobra said:
8 Weeks



Indeed he is (y)
Plus of course they are looking for warmth aka the radiated heat from occupied dwellings.
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It’s not just here either, my niece in a very small ‘town’ (they call it a town I’d call it a hamlet) Western Australia gets rats coming into the house every Winter to keep the spiders company :).
 
MartynK said:
Does the black rat (rattus rattus) still occur in the UK? I'm just curious.
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Yes they are still around. Nowhere near as common as norvegicus certianly these days. I've not seen one in a few years, but some of my fellow pesties have.
Particularly in London
They (traditionally) tend to be around dock area's They prefer to climb and get up "high" rather than live at ground level.
To that end they tend to seek out high rise buildings.
 
Cobra said:
Yes they are still around. Nowhere near as common as norvegicus certianly these days. I've not seen one in a few years, but some of my fellow pesties have.
Particularly in London
They (traditionally) tend to be around dock area's They prefer to climb and get up "high" rather than live at ground level.
To that end they tend to seek out high rise buildings.
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Thanks. Also known as ship's rat and roof rat in the past, which fits in with your info. I think they're the rats that are usually blamed for spreading plague too...
 
MartynK said:
Also known as ship's rat and roof rat in the past,
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Absolutely (y)

MartynK said:
I think they're the rats that are usually blamed for spreading plague too...
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They always were the guilty party. However there does seem to be evidence that suggests that it wasn't the fleas on the Rats, but the fleas on the giant gerbil from central Asia ...
So who knows for sure?
 
Cobra said:
Absolutely (y)


They always were the guilty party. However there does seem to be evidence that suggests that it wasn't the fleas on the Rats, but the fleas on the giant gerbil from central Asia ...
So who knows for sure?
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I've come across the giant gerbil theory, and there are others that implicate rats, marmots, ground squirrels, prairie dogs and other burrowing rodents as hosts in various places. Humans - and other mammals - may have acted as conduits too, as hosts for infected fleas after their rodent hosts died, and as direct carriers of pneumonic plague.
 
Cobra said:
Absolutely (y)


They always were the guilty party. However there does seem to be evidence that suggests that it wasn't the fleas on the Rats, but the fleas on the giant gerbil from central Asia ...
So who knows for sure?
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Plague’s been around for much longer than people realise, at least from Neolithic times so maybe rats then gerbils now or whatever. Interesting pair of programmes partly about plague but mostly DNA:
https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/m000cngz
https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/m000cl70
 
I thought that it came over the channel in fleas on rats then got transported around on humans (or possibly on rats hitching rides on carriages).
 
Server Hamster said:
At least no one's blamed hamsters. View attachment 264824
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If I dig deep enough I'm sure I could find a link :D

Nod said:
I thought that it came over the channel in fleas on rats
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That has been the general consensus for years, but as above .. It may not have been the rat.

MartynK said:
I've come across the giant gerbil theory, and there are others that implicate rats, marmots, ground squirrels, prairie dogs and other burrowing rodents as hosts in various places.
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In truth I guess we will never know, but rats being the most hated of (Small) mammals, were bound to get the blame.
Of course any warm blooded animal is capable of carrying fleas. Not forgetting the traditional ships cat, that would have been hunting rats and mice in galley etc.
 
Cobra said:
If I dig deep enough I'm sure I could find a link :D


That has been the general consensus for years, but as above .. It may not have been the rat.


In truth I guess we will never know, but rats being the most hated of (Small) mammals, were bound to get the blame.
Of course any warm blooded animal is capable of carrying fleas. Not forgetting the traditional ships cat, that would have been hunting rats and mice in galley etc.
Click to expand...
You’ve left out one obvious mammalian carrier — Homo notverysapiens, particularly resistant individuals, could have transported it. Customs and immigration was even more ramshackle back in Neolithic days than it is now.
 
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