Rats

[Aperitif]

If the rats are doing no more than helping themselves to the warmth and food of your compost heap, and aren't bothering you, why do anything?

There are always rats around whatever you do. It's when they start eating your food or your house that you need to worry.

'ware the dessert rats.

 

[Gromit]

I find them very entertaining, they get up to all sorts of mischief.

 

[dudi]

If you're near Reading, I'd be happy to bring Poppy out for a day:

She's the one at the top left. The big dog is much too wet to despatch a rat, despite looking mean.

I was going to say... just get a Jack Russell Terrier. it'll save on the cost of a new compost bin and will also save on the cost of toys for the JRT...

We're getting our puppy at the end of feb... can't wait. he can sniff out the mice from under the sheds!

 

[Davidc]

'ware the dessert rats.

Their bodies are very efficient at conserving water.

 

[661-Pete]

Time, I think, to air the hoary old poser "you're never more than ten feet from a rat" (in our cities, at least). True or false?

I'm inclined to be sceptical. So, apparently, are Snopes. But in areas where there's plenty of food and shelter for them, they can, locally, be plentiful.

 

[rich p]

If the rats are doing no more than helping themselves to the warmth and food of your compost heap, and aren't bothering you, why do anything?

There are always rats around whatever you do. It's when they start eating your food or your house that you need to worry.

Mrs rich p was rather spooked by finding that she'd inadvertently killed one of the baby rats with the spade and then had to dispose of the other five. They also eat the bird food so on balance I'd rather they weren't around!

 

[Fnaar]

We had some in closed bin (see thread at : http://www.cyclechat.co.uk/forums/showthread.php?t=5518&highlight=rat+compost )
In the end, "the man from the council" laid poison over a few trips, and I had to dig them out. I asked him what to do with the bodies, he said "bag them, and take them to the local dump". So I did.

 

[summerdays]

We've got 2 darlek bins, and don't seem to have a problem - we did have one rat in the past and since then we don't put any thing like bread that I used to put on the heap, so now its only veg peelings and garden waste. Loads of worms though.

 

[rich p]

Be careful - they often carry a ghastly disease called Weil's disease which is spread by their urine.

Agreed, rat-shite and urine is nasty stuff. You don't want it in your compost.
If it was me I'd place a trap in the bin, on top of the compost, baited with a bit of bacon rind or other meat. My brother has exactly the same problem, so periodically it's a case of getting the trap out.......

Ah, Fnaar, nothing new in the world of CycleChat!

The 2 posts from your thread bother me too!

 

[twentysix by twentyfive]

Poisoned rats = dead owls

I'll tell Speicher

 

[vernon]

I despatched the two rats that lived in my dialek compost bin with a standard rat trap baited with peanut butter. I bagged and binned the corpses.

 

[661-Pete]

I despatched the two rats that lived in my dalek compost bin with a standard rat trap baited with peanut butter. I bagged and binned the corpses.

Shouldn't that be "ex-ter-mi-nated"?

 

[Alien8]

We get them periodically coming in the garden from under next door's shed. Got one of them humane traps with a plan of liberating them somewhere far (enough) away. Both times I set the trap I successfully caught...a hedgehog. Of course the spikey buggers can't reverse out so I have to dismantle the trap each time to let them go. I'm quite happy to let the rats do their own thing but the wife ain't so keen.

 

[Ashtrayhead]

Time, I think, to air the hoary old poser "you're never more than ten feet from a rat" (in our cities, at least). True or false?

I'm inclined to be sceptical. So, apparently, are Snopes. But in areas where there's plenty of food and shelter for them, they can, locally, be plentiful.

There's some truth in that! When I used to work nights in Bromley, the CCTV people would sometimes pan the cameras round in the pedestrianised area in the High Street and we could see the rats coming out of the gratings around the trees. Loads of them there were, great big things too!

 

[twentysix by twentyfive]

There's some truth in that! When I used to work nights in Bromley, the CCTV people would sometimes pan the cameras round in the pedestrianised area in the High Street and we could see the rats coming out of the gratings around the trees. Loads of them there were, great big things too!