The work on the roof is finished, pretty well. Guy will come back on Monday to tidy up. What we really want now is some heavy rain, to check if any of it is still getting into the house. It isn’t forecast, though. After the wettest year for a long time…
I’m going to Norwich tomorrow, picking Ro up from his house and parking at the Park’n’Ride, to go into the city together. Everyone who lives near Norwich simply calls it The City. We’ve both got various things to do, some of them together. Nice to have some mother and son time, he’s good company. Mostly, I’m easing off for a few days. I do need to do the auction accounts – I’ve paid everyone and notified everyone, though I need to contact one person again – but it’s the income and expenditure bit that I must write down. Then it’s just regular stuff, which is quite busy but no pressure.
I had a horrible experience yesterday, though it wasn’t as bad as the rat’s. I’ve tried, in the past, to control rats in various ways. Keeping them out doesn’t work. They gnaw and tunnel and get past every defence. Traps are not much good. They will catch a few rats, but about one in ten times, the poor rat isn’t killed, but is horribly injured. And it’s no good putting a trap where a chicken or anything else can get to it. I tried putting them under weighted-down milk crates, but chickens are intensely curious and jiggled at the side of the crate until the trap was set off. So, with the greatest reluctance, only poison will keep them at bay. If they aren’t controlled, it’s awful. They’ll run everywhere, even in front of you in daylight.
Yesterday, the chickens were making quite a noise in the henhouse, but two were still in the run. I had some greens and soaked bread for them, so fed them and shut the door and went to investigate. A dead rat was in the henhouse. I fetched a shovel to pick it up: it wasn’t dead. Poor creature. I put it in a pot and then in the bin – couldn’t leave it out in case something ate it. Then I fed the cats as usual. Today, Wink went to feed the cats and found that the chickens were out, and agitated. I realised that I had shut their door but hadn’t shut the other door, as I’d been wood-preserving the hen house yesterday and had been completely distracted from closing everything because of the rat. So lucky that the fox hadn’t found out. I’m chastened. Little Mama cat hadn’t had her breakfast, because the chickens bullied her, but when I let them in their run, they hurried in for their own breakfast and a drink, so I fed her again. All calm after that, but I felt dreadful.
If anyone has the faintest idea what to do about rats that doesn’t involve poison, I’d be glad to know. I won’t need to do anything for a few months though, anyway.
I keep getting notifications that people (spammers) have changed the password on their registration here. People, you can’t post unless I approve your comment. If you’re okay, you won’t have to be approved again, but the first comment is judged by me before it turns up here. And you’ll go into spam if there’s a link. 748 of those, right now, which have all been deleted unread. Frankly, I’m going to assume that anything from “Googlebot” isn’t any friend of mine.
There is nothing you can do about rats without poison. And once you have them, you will have them forever. That piece of advice from the local farmer, which, much as we didn’t like it at the time it was provided, was found to be true.
Some sorts of poison are better than others. Mole Country Stores do their own brand (in both block and pelleted form – using both together is best as they contain different active ingredients) and we’ve found that to be the best. The blocks are best threaded onto heavy duty wire and fixed down/tied to something heavy, then they have to eat them rather than carry them away to store. The red pellets have to be consumed in situ, and need putting under something like an old wire shopping basket (or equivalent) to keep birds away from them.
Rats are also very clever – once they have seen one of their friends getting caught in a trap, they will avoid traps forever (this info from an outdoor motion-sensitive camera). Glue traps are now banned in this country, but don’t work (at least outdoors) anyway, and are too cruel even for rats that have bitten the head off one of your hens.
Russell used to put down pellets, but I’m afraid of one getting left in the henhouse and pecked, so I use blocks. The traps containing them have an inner ‘room’ so that hedgehogs, chickens etc can’t get in and then, as you say, the blocks are threaded on a metal stick. With all the waterways around here, there will always be rats. A couple of years ago, there was quite an outbreak at the old mill, next to the church, so there was a poison campaign done there too and the population is only just recovering. Apart from a glue trap being horrible, the thought of finding a live rat trapped in one is dreadful. Absolutely no justification for them.
I’ve already noticed that the feed level in the corn bin isn’t diminishing so fast.
Sounds like you are doing everything possible. Good luck!
A mink once bit the head off a sitting hen. Such a shock for Russell, who didn’t let me see her. He loved birds so much, it was awful for him.
Our downstairs shower room is out of action at the moment, the toilet hadn’t been installed correctly so for well over two weeks we had a dehumidifier drying out years of damp from the joists. Whilst this was happening it was discovered a rat or rats had entered , it appeared to have come from the outside drain so have had non returnable valves fitted so any wildlife can get out but not in.
A few years ago we had mice come in through broken airbricks, these now have covers on them to prevent this. Our house was built about 90 years ago so very new compared to yours.
Must add the insurance company LV were very efficient, we were referred to a company who have organised the various trades to eventually restore the room back to use, however it is taking a long time.