# Rats



## alfiethetortoise (Nov 22, 2009)

What a crazy week it's been here.....

From Wednesday have had really bad flooding. On thursday monring i went to my outhouse (its attatched to my house and is kind of like a glorified shed) to get some milk at 6:15am and saw a rat!

I paniced called everyone i could think of, and it was decided the rat was there because it probably had been flooded out of its home...

So in the meantime i precede with caution and this morning at about 7:30 go to get some milk and there it is again....

Anyone have any advice on how to get rid of the rat? I called my house renting people and they said to call environmental health but it doesn't seem to me that they will come out. The council say that rats basically are your problem but apparently "under the Prevention of Damage by Pests Act 1949 the local authority can, where necessary, carry out the control work and recover the cost of such action from the landowner or occupier."

How do i get rid of it?! As it's a sunday now i doubt ill get far phoning anyone  ....


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## dmmj (Nov 22, 2009)

you could always get a cat.


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## Yvonne G (Nov 22, 2009)

I had a similar problem several years ago. My leopard tortoise shed used to be my chicken coop shed. One night I went out there to close up the chickens. It was dusk. The shed seemed to be moving. Upon closer inspection it was rats. There were hundred of them crawling all over my shed, inside an out. I'm not exaggerating! Since it was almost dark, there was nothing I could do at the moment, so I waited until the next day, hoping my chickens would be ok.

The next day I placed many, many boxes of D-Con all around inside the shed, and all over my property inside the old vacant house on the back of my property, under flower pots, in the garage...all over the place. I was rid of the rats by the end of the week. That stuff really works. But you have to make sure none of your animals have access to it.

Come to find out, the day before, my next door neighbor had torn down their old, un-used barn, displacing all their rats.


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## alfiethetortoise (Nov 22, 2009)

I don't think that cats kill rats, but terriers do. I dont have the time for cats or dogs and i worry that when im not paying attention they could hurt the toddler (more correctly, she would annoy them, they would scratch or bite or get in her bed etc)

Ill be heading straight to that hardware store for some rat poison tomorrow.....

I am still sure the rat is only here because of the bad flooding we have had. The road out the village has reopened today for the first time since thursday but its still raining so could easily be closed again. Schools shut till at least wednesday. I suppose i should be gratefull that my house wasn't flooded and all i got was an inconvenience of a rat....

Yvonne, i hope that your chickens survived to tell the tale!


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## Shelly (Nov 22, 2009)

You keep milk in your outhouse? Forgive me, but that's just a little disgusting.


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## alfiethetortoise (Nov 22, 2009)

The milk is in a fridge freezer, one of those tall combo things. It is in the outhouse because I live in a cottage and the kitchen is so tiny that only a special sized fridge will fit in a space under the stairs These are more expensive and then normal sized ones and when i move im left with a very small sized fridge which will not fit everything in anyway. 

There is power in the outhouse (plugs and lights), it is more like a porch with doors and a slate roof. So it's not really an outbuilding as such. I'm just in the habbit of calling it an outhouse...


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## Yvonne G (Nov 22, 2009)

Shelly said:


> You keep milk in your outhouse? Forgive me, but that's just a little disgusting.



You're either being funny, or thinking of the olden days when the potty used to be in what we called an outhouse. Some folks refer to their sheds as outhouses.

I have put D-Con inside a tortoise house before. You just have to be VERY certain that the tortoise can't get to it. If you can place it under something like a broken clay pot, where the mouse or rat can get in, but the tortoise can't, then place a brick on top to make it heavy.


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## bikerchicspain (Nov 22, 2009)

A jack russell or a ferret. I have seen a ferret crush a full grown rats head in one go...


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## alfiethetortoise (Nov 22, 2009)

I'm not entirely sure about whats funny about putting the fridge in the outhouse. It's really not a shed, though it did leak a little in all the floods! There is a toilet in the out house, which at one time would have been the only toilet in the house. It is madeof stone, and is an L shape with the door being at the bottom right of the L . There isn't food all over the outhouse, in fact there is mostly bikes, paints, shoes, coats etc. All the food is in the house except obviously what is in the fridge/freezer.

Alfie certainly never goes in the outhouse, so i dont worry about him eating it. My little girl (18months) does however so i'll be going for a trap or a poison tunnel so the rat gets stuck and there isn't poison everywhere. Urgh.


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## alfiethetortoise (Nov 22, 2009)

Ahhh i am so relieved. A facebook plea for a rat, free to any kind of home, has resulted in someone offering to come with rat traps and get the rat! See, this is why i love living in a village! So long ratty, one more night of freedom and you have had it!!!


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## Stephanie Logan (Nov 22, 2009)

alfiethetortoise said:


> I'm not entirely sure about whats funny about putting the fridge in the outhouse. It's really not a shed, though it did leak a little in all the floods! There is a toilet in the out house, which at one time would have been the only toilet in the house. It is madeof stone, and is an L shape with the door being at the bottom right of the L . There isn't food all over the outhouse, in fact there is mostly bikes, paints, shoes, coats etc. All the food is in the house except obviously what is in the fridge/freezer.
> 
> Alfie certainly never goes in the outhouse, so i dont worry about him eating it. My little girl (18months) does however so i'll be going for a trap or a poison tunnel so the rat gets stuck and there isn't poison everywhere. Urgh.



I think what we have here is a failure to communicate. In this case, an outhouse is English (as in England) for what we Americans used to call a lean-to, or a small attached enclosed porch. Here in America, we labeled as an outhouse what could also be called a privy, where people had their privacy for their private functions.

I read in the paper about the Lake District being flooded with the worst deluge in recorded history. Hope the Alfiethetortoise family are all safe and dry (except the rat, of course), and have access to groceries and laundry facilities!


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## Kadaan (Nov 22, 2009)

Heh, I was confused a minute too! When I think of an 'outhouse' I think of one of these:


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## alfiethetortoise (Nov 22, 2009)

Ahh the joys of language barriers! It vaguely crossed my mind that could be what was meant, but i mean why would anyone put milk in there?!  Yes, the flooding is very very bad. The worst i have ever seen and certainly the worst the village has been on record. We have escaped safe dry and fed (though trips to the fridge freezer have been limited due to rat-fear!) though the village ran out of milk and bread some days ago! Hoping to escape the village for the first time today and also hoping they dont close the road again in my absence so i can return, and the rat is soon to meet its demise!


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## GloreyAye (Dec 12, 2009)

Rats really killing me to death my favorite shoes were eaten by rat, and now I cannot wear or use it. Can you help? How can I remove this pest in our house ? I have still more shoes and dresses in our house that I want to be safe. 


_________________


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## dmmj (Dec 12, 2009)

LOL, You gotta love those spammers, I always laugh at the posts.


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## Laura (Dec 12, 2009)

If they are banned,, how do they post?


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## dmmj (Dec 12, 2009)

they get banned after they post if I am not mistaken.


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## Stephanie Logan (Dec 12, 2009)

Hey, I want to know what happened to Sir Rat of the cottage.

Were you able to document his demise, or did he disappear and depart on his own?


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## alfiethetortoise (Dec 12, 2009)

Stephanie Logan said:


> Hey, I want to know what happened to Sir Rat of the cottage.
> 
> Were you able to document his demise, or did he disappear and depart on his own?




I was spammed?! I feel violated....

Sir Rat made his lucky escape back to his nice sewer home after the floods. His trap is still waiting for his return, but it's not very likely at all now. Lets hope Sir Rat doesn't decide to take any more 'holidays' in my outbuildings!


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## dmmj (Dec 12, 2009)

Of course I noticed that most of the spammers (here at least) deal with shoes. I did not know turtles and shoes go together.


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