For Those With Rats Or Mice

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Cobland

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There seems to be a rise in numbers this year, apparently its down to strange summer. I overheard a lady at the feed store yesterday that she has found a new way to kill them without using traps or poisons.

Get a swing bin, fill it half full with water. stick on a nice treat to the lid, something like cheese for mice, or meat for rats, things they cant resist. Mouse or rat goes onto the lid to get the treat and the lid falls making the pest go into the water. They drown as they are unable to climb back out again.

After talking to her she said that she had 2 terriers at the stables and they couldnt get all the rats she had. She said that the first day she tried it, she got 8 rats.
 
Bit gruesome but tempted to try it
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OMG my cat came home yesterday with a massive brown and white rat. I don't know where he found it but I've never seen a rat that big. I didn't know that wild rats were coloured. although i don't like them it was quite bonny colour. it's tail was about a foot long.
 
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she has found a new way to kill them without using traps or poisons.


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Well what is a swing bin full of water & some food as bait called if not a trap
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I guess Christmas Cob means without the traps or poisons that hurt our dogs/cats/etc! hurting the pesky rats is not as sad to me I have to say... we have a couple of rats, one has been going "upstairs" to sit with our chickens at roost.
 
Our yard is over-run with rats at the moment. There is an older horse on the yard (30+) who we kept finding blood around his hooves. Vet has been and says the rats are nibbling on him.
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At home, we are getting at least one mouse a day brought in by the cats.
 
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Our yard is over-run with rats at the moment. There is an older horse on the yard (30+) who we kept finding blood around his hooves. Vet has been and says the rats are nibbling on him.
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Omigod, that is awful.
 
I didn't know that wild rate were coloured. although i don't like them it was quite bonny colour.

Perhaps you should start breeding them ? They could become very popular. You could show it in a 'traditional' rat classes
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I thought you meant pet rats/mice when I read the title.

I have pet mice and I dont mind the little wild ones, all my feed is in bins so I dont really get any in my stable or little tack room at the back of my stable.

Wild rats are horrible though, I dont see many around the stables but see quite a few down the fields.
 
Although I agree with rat control...somehow the idea of eight of them drowning in a swing bin makes me uncomfortable.
I wonder which is the quickest, most painless death for a rat/mouse? Probably terrier, or cat?
S
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Although I agree with rat control...somehow the idea of eight of them drowning in a swing bin makes me uncomfortable.
I wonder which is the quickest, most painless death for a rat/mouse? Probably terrier, or cat?
S
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S - don't know if this will put your mind at rest at all, but I'm an ecologist and did some work out in Madagascar clearing rats from an island to protect the ground-nesting birds there. We caught them in humane traps (called Longworth Traps) then drowned them in buckets of seawater. So I think drowning is possibly preferable to traps which snap shut? I personally have no problem with the method the OP suggested, esp if it is more efficient than a terrier at actually clearing the blasted things! Might try it at some point....
 
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Although I agree with rat control...somehow the idea of eight of them drowning in a swing bin makes me uncomfortable.S
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I'm glad I'm not to only one who felt like that. They'll have just have swum round & round & round, until eventually they can't swim any more, & totally exhausted they do then sink & drown. Give me a terrier, cat, or gun to deal with the problem any day.
 
I'm afraid we had to resort to this method last year, we were over run despite a healthy population of Buzzards, fox and feral cats + a terrier and a lurcher in situ! the rats were getting out of control and poison wasn't touching them, the bin idea did clear most of them, we used an old dustbin with some food in the bottom and a snug fitting lid with a hole in it. I'm loathe to use it but rats are a problem... :-/

emw
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S - don't know if this will put your mind at rest at all, but I'm an ecologist and did some work out in Madagascar clearing rats from an island to protect the ground-nesting birds there. We caught them in humane traps (called Longworth Traps) then drowned them in buckets of seawater. So I think drowning is possibly preferable to traps which snap shut? I personally have no problem with the method the OP suggested, esp if it is more efficient than a terrier at actually clearing the blasted things! Might try it at some point....

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I know where you're coming from...and I'm a realist...I'd rather avoid anything suffering...if possible.
I actually like rodents, rats are so clever, adaptable and flexible in their lifestyles it is hard not to admire them. So whilst I accept they have to be controlled, I'd like to do the best way possible....for them.
S
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PS You all think I'm weird now, don't you?
 
thought you meant pet one also!!

Blessed with never having had a rat or mouse or any other creature other than occasional spider, I can even if lazy leave a bag of feed out and nothing nibbles it!!

Think mainly due to the fact we have a house nearby the yard who have many many cats!!!
 
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I actually like rodents, rats are so clever, adaptable and flexible in their lifestyles it is hard not to admire them. So whilst I accept they have to be controlled, I'd like to do the best way possible....for them.
S
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PS You all think I'm weird now, don't you?

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Well that's how I think of them as well, so I'll join you in being thought of as weird
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PS You all think I'm weird now, don't you?

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You mean you didn't think we thought you were weird before
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Although I agree with rat control...somehow the idea of eight of them drowning in a swing bin makes me uncomfortable.S
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I'm glad I'm not to only one who felt like that. They'll have just have swum round & round & round, until eventually they can't swim any more, & totally exhausted they do then sink & drown. Give me a terrier, cat, or gun to deal with the problem any day.

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Ditto.

My old yard had a real problem with them but my current one I haven't seen one in two years! YO is obsessive about sweeping, all feed must be in bins and no hay is to be left on the floor. Seems to work - I've seen the odd mouse around but that's it
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They keep shitting on my hay in my lockup, think I will have to try the swing bin without water in and then take them to the nearest illegal travellers camp and release them, all the rats can live together then and my concience wont bother me regarding drowning.
 
Ive never tried the swing bin, i just never heard of this method before.

The feed here is all locked up in freezers or metal bins, but they still seem to hang around, as apparently they can live off the much heap, yummy.

They used to have a cat there until the cat decided to use the saddles as scratching posts.
 
I thought you meant by the title, pet rats in which case I have 2! And I wouldnt consider killing wild ones in such a nasty way. Drowning isn't exactly humane...

We have mice in our feed room but found the best way to deal with them is with a humane trap - its a metal device with plastic see-through lid. They basically just walk in and gravity closes the door behind them. Pretty simple. I caught 6 in 1 night! Then I just let them go and the very bottom of my garden (we have a big garden...). Haven't seen any in there for ages
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There must be more around this year as last week my JRT got a rat and two mice, amazing tally for a idle 5yo JRT who had only caught one other rat up till that point.
 
I've been using the bin method, along with various other things. I've just used a dustbin half full of water with oats and straw sprinkled on top.

I've caught 4 so far. None in the humane trap even though it's loaded with jaffa cakes, pony nuts, cheese and oats! a mouse in the splat trap and the poison is still sitting there.

Hey ho.

They've crapped all over my hay, something has made an attempt at chewing through my feed bins, and they wreck anything made of wood/fibre/cloth so as far as I'm concerned if they won't bugger off some other way they can drown!
 
I watched a programme on Sky last night about rats. The reason we have so many is that we make it incredibly easy for them. They enjoy living along side us, thinking of us as friends!! Oh how wrong they are, we just want to drown them
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I don't think I could use that method, I'd be sitting at home thinking of them swimming around for hours getting exhausted and then dying!! Must be because we have pet gerbils and guinea pigs!

Although we don't have mice or rats at home. Normally get some mice early in the winter at the yard, but we have a brilliant mouse catcher. One of the other liveries lays traps and catches them. She's amazing, I think she is like the pied piper!! Not a pleasent job but it has to be done..
 
I'm told by someone in the know that it's now illegal to transfer live vermin to somewhere else. ie someone elses' property, including your local wood or hedgerow, as everywhere belongs to someone.

You are expected to despatch them yourself.

So if that is true and we are to follow the letter of the law, we have to either drop said vermin off on our own property or kill 'em
 
I don't transfer them to someone else's property, we have a massive garden (ie. an entire field size...!) and surrounded by fields otherwise.

I don't think police will be enforcing that... as long as you do it with common sense (ie. don't just chuck them into next doors garden).
 
Never mind mice and rats - those damn rabbits are ruining the paddocks. If I have to move the fence up any more to prevent my horse getting her hoof stuck in a hole she'll be standing in a 1m sq area!
 
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