Heute Morgen habe ich gesehen, wie eine Ratte in unserem Garten Mehlwürmer gefressen hat. Es kam ziemlich oft rein und raus! Wir haben seit Ewigkeiten ein Loch unter dem Zaun und fragten uns, welches Tier das ausgegraben hat. Ich finde diesen kleinen Kerl bezaubernd und es stört mich nicht, aber ich weiß, dass einige Leute sofort Maßnahmen ergreifen würden, um die Ratte loszuwerden. Sollte ich mir eigentlich Sorgen machen? Oder kann ich es einfach sein bestes Leben führen lassen?
Von: lizgr
40 Comments
1 or 2, lovely.
Wait until mid summer when you have 15-20 juveniles scrambling about uncontrollably. The stench of urine unmistakable.
Then you will wish it never became a thing.
(From experience)
When 2 become one ☝️ you will have hundreds of other rats running about making a terrible mess and making a smell of urine you won’t be able to shift easy. Also they climb and will come into your house! Enjoy 😊
I block their holes, plant lavender along their paths and do what I can to discourage them without harming them.
I had to stop feeding the birds as it was attracting them 😔
We catch them in a trap and release them somewhere else
you don’t have to hunt it down, but you should stop leaving food out on the ground now that you know you’re feeding rats. It’s not fair on your neighbors: for you it might be just in the garden, but for them the rats might take up residence in their house/shed etc.
Unfortunately yes, they carry real diseases of concern, like Weil’s disease which can be fatal or cause organ damage just from coming into contact with infected rat urine through broken skin. If you are seeing rats out in the open during daylight it means you have a large population close by already. Better to remove the food source now before it becomes a much more challenging problem. You can start feeding the birds again in a few months after they have been removed. But, the rat looks to be coming in from the neighbours property. I would let them know so they can find the nests/tunnel network. There are humane traps you can be use if you wouldn’t want to cause harm. Best of luck with it.
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Good luck with that.
Bucket trap , dont do nothing i like animals but rats will multuply and can ruin your home and garden
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I had the pleasure of them a couple of years ago, they were expensive to get rid of and chewed through electric cables which could have been very dangerous.
The pest control advised that some bird feed actually acts as an antidote to their poison so if someone is trying to ‘control’ the population, they may just be adding a new food source if they are also going to a bird feeder as well
I know people are complaining about urine smells, but I find that rats don’t urinate almost continually, unlike mice that do. I’ve had several rat pets and they are one of the cleanest animals I’ve looked after.
I know that it’s never a good idea to encourage such wildlife, but everthing’s gotta eat!
I had a mama and 2 juveniles climb my wall to reach a bird feeder on my 2nd floor window… I think they are very cute, clever little creatures, but alas I know the issues they can cause so stopped putting food out for a long while.
I’m a vegetarian, won’t kill animals, daughter also vegetarian and kept pet rats for years. However, wild rats can cause real damage: eat through wood, cables, pipes and concrete! They can also pass on deadly diseases.
Unfortunately, you’d best stop feeding and take steps to at least discourage or preferable remove from near where there are people.
Depends if you mind them getting into your house
I’d remove the food source rather than taking more drastic measures.
Beautiful though rats are, they can cause damage to property.
Unfortunately I didn’t think to wear gloves inside my attic and hadn’t realised rats had been up there peeing and crapping. Wiels disease luckily caught in time – first symptoms huge inexplainable bruise along the whole forearm and losing 42lbs in weight in 8 weeks.
Start looking around the outside of your home.
If your house has vents at the bottom of the external walls, check if they’ve been damaged.
If you’ve got a manhole cover nearby check that too for gaps or holes.
If you’re ever concerned that they might be getting into your home, I recommend the old fashioned snap-trap over the “humane” methods which, frankly, are humane in name only.
Trap-and-release traps for example are only humane at the point of capture if you actually monitor them.
That sounds obvious, but plenty of people don’t. They set them with good intentions, forget about them, and later find a dead animal that’s been trapped for days.
That isn’t a peaceful death. The animal will injure itself trying to escape, suffer dehydration, and be under constant stress the entire time.
Even when people remember to check them, there’s a second problem. If you release the animal nearby, it just comes straight back. If you take it far enough away to stop that happening, you’re dumping it into an unfamiliar area where it doesn’t know where food is, where shelter is, or which areas to avoid to stay alive.
You’ve solved your own problem by creating a worse one for the animal.
If you don’t want wild rats or mice in your home, the most humane option is the snap trap. It doesn’t rely on follow-up, memory, or luck. It kills instantly and ends the situation, instead of stretching the suffering out and pretending that makes it kinder.
Tats go where there is food and shelter- simple
You do understand that vermin don’t do the single life? In a year, one becomes 1,000. Hope you’ve got enough food!
If you don’t deal with them. they will become a problem.
Probably an unpopular opinion on Reddit, but I’m out in the country and have a river on my land so there’s definitely a population nearby.
My staffy took out a few this summer and I’ve not seen one in the garden since.
Dispatch on site
Wait until it moves into
Your house & gives you Weils Disease. My calfs died a really horrible death due to rats & Weils disease.
Maybe try a house brick and knock the little f****r on the head 😂😂
In all seriousness before you know it they’ll be nesting in the attic so stomp it out straight away
One small friend will lead to loads of friends if you just leave it.
Mix cayenne pepper in with your mealworms. Only mammals are affected by capsicum, so the birds will be fine with it. It seems to work on my bird tables. I live in Sherwood Forest and, like you, I’m not too bothered if I have a rat or two, but I do try and keep and eye on them and keep good bird table hygiene.
You don’t have one rat – that’s just the only one you’ve seen.
Stop feeding them or you and your neighbours will be over-run,
Your ‘adorable little guy’ is a disease carrying destructive pest
Yeah but where’d you get that pot from
I’d be livid if my neighbours were feeding and encouraging nesting rats around my property. Your cute “small friend” is unlikely to be alone, particularly if you continue to provide a food source. Females reach sexual maturity at around 5–8 weeks and can produce 5–7 litters each year.
Can you ask it to come and talk to the one living in my kitchen, we aren’t getting on to well.
Just lol you think it’s the same rodent each time…
Yep
Yes
I hope it stays as one, and stays outside!
Care for a rat?
https://preview.redd.it/lwvkjez6stbg1.jpeg?width=1179&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=36787ae606ecf1441ab725b02d10fe68c9b11c4b
My “bird” feeder was a hit this summer 😆😅
I’ve just had to put a Fenns rat trap under my mams sink, she has a visitor. But not for long.
No matter what anyone says, rats are not your friends and will disrupt everything.