Rats in garden and noises in loft

[du tan]

Originally Posted by nightshade

Please, Please, check and double check that they are NOT Bats
The droppings appear very similar but the Bat dropping is dry and
crumbles easily being only the chitenous parts of insects
see bat poo in the Gallery

Thanks for checking, but they are definitely rats. I know this after catching one of them in a rat trap.

[Gill Catton]

I read recently innew scientist that rats are naturally repelled by the smell of cats urine. They automatically move away on encountering the smell - unless they are infected with a parasite that requires a cat to complete its life cycle in which case the rat loses the instinct to move increasing its chances of being eaten due to this loss of fear...

Only partially relevant here I know but interesting none-the-less - maybe the scattered cat nip encourages cats to wee a bit perhaps territorially (because obviously cats love it) and this in trun deters the rats....

so cats don't necessarily remove rats by killing them, they just deter them from the immediate area.

[demicav]

Originally Posted by du tan

I am currently experiencing noises in the loft, which has turned out to be rats.

By the way, you wont want to hear this (altough you dont want to hear the noise either!), but if you have one, you are likely to have quite a few -that goes for mice as well.

The easiest way to find out wha they are, is inspect the area the noise is coming from for droppings. That will tell you in no uncertain terms, what they are.

You then need to find out how they are getting in.

Some local councils will treat rat problems for free -mine has, although I have caught one so far myself in a trap.

Good luck.

I hope this was a humane trap. Rats are living things too. Also I don't like the idea of people using poison, it really does get into the food chain and can affect other animals.

[snowdrop]

My two dogs are excellent ratters but there is one full grown rat the colour af a red squirrel that is out-foxing both of them. Its a brilliant acrobat and so fast...its also very hard-faced leaping into the air after any bird within its range. Grrrr!
If only the owls would return.

[bagpuss]

Thanks for all the replies and advice guys - I haven't actually been on this forum for ages! Anyhoo, we have recently cut down some conifer trees which were getting overgrown and very near to our house and ever since then we haven't heard any noises at all. I think perhaps whatever was getting in the loft was possibly using the conifers as a sort of "bridge" and way of getting onto the roof.

We did see a small rat on our nut feeder a few weeks ago but we have moved that to another position so it's virtually impossible for him to get to, and fingers crossed, we haven't seen him since. I am pretty convinced now though that it was a wood mouse in the loft.

We did also last year buy a rat zapper which you put food into and when the rat enters it gets an electric shock. I know it's not nice to think of killing them but at least it's quick. We did catch a couple in it last year but so far we haven't really had the need to use it this year as the only one we've seen was the one we saw on the nuts a few weeks ago. Also as we're having our garden cleared a bit, there's less places for them to hide I suppose.

Tina

[du tan]

Originally Posted by demicav

I hope this was a humane trap. Rats are living things too. Also I don't like the idea of people using poison, it really does get into the food chain and can affect other animals.

It wasnt a humane trap, I killed it.

Rats are disease-ridden vermin, and although I agree with you, poison getting into the food chain is bad news. Disease-ridden rats scratching away in my loft, which they are entering from (the empty) next door's loft, leaving droppings and foul urine smells everywhere, and keeping me away for endless nights has not exactly earned any favour from me.

In the wild, although I would never encourage them, I accept they have their place. In my house, however, they do not.

[demicav]

Originally Posted by du tan

It wasnt a humane trap, I killed it.

Rats are disease-ridden vermin, and although I agree with you, poison getting into the food chain is bad news. Disease-ridden rats scratching away in my loft, which they are entering from (the empty) next door's loft, leaving droppings and foul urine smells everywhere, and keeping me away for endless nights has not exactly earned any favour from me.

In the wild, although I would never encourage them, I accept they have their place. In my house, however, they do not.

Pigeons carry far worse. Rats are wildlife, living things and cruel traps should be banned. I do however agree something needs to be done, you cannot have rats running around your loft, I know that, but surely there is a kinder way to get rid of them ? You say you only cought one in the trap so it's not getting to the root of the problem, after all rats are very quick breeders. We'll just have to agree to disagree about the trap. If I had the problem I would explore all options and start with the most humane, then if all else fails I would end up using other less favourable methods.

[du tan]

I can see what you say about pigeons, although they would be comparitively easier to catch humanely and throw out of my loft, so its a bad analogy.

Balancing the amount of diseases they carry, and discomfort I suffered with them keeping me awake at night, my threshold for tolerating this was very low -I will add here, I have been brought up with pets, and would consider myself an animal lover.

However, rats are incredibly clever (as well as dirty, noisy disease-ridden etc) so humane traps was not something I was prepared to go through with.

I have blocked up the holes to next doors loft with wire wool (which they dont eat through) -and between that and using one of those electronic pulses, the further traps I have, have not gone off and there's been no further noises.

Prevention is better than cure, certainly, but i dont think many of the general population would have much sympathy with your argument.

[Susie]

My sister in law had rats in the garden and kept hearing noises in the loft which she thought were caused by rats. I was very skeptical and thought it was more likely to be squirrels but the pest controls came round last week and she does indeed have rats in her loft. The pest controllers said that rats have no problem climbing high walls. They have a cat but he spends most of his time sleeping!

[chrisl]

We did this at our last house and it worked.By the way,if you stick your nose through the loft hatch and sniff up,you will"smell a rat"

Originally Posted by Wild-Woman

This sounds more like House mice to me. Think most people get them at one time or another-we certainly do, as the weather cools down. They do make a heck of a racket, especially if they dart about on the plasterboard in between the rafters. Sometimes it sounds like they're all wearing clogs!

I'd get a humane trap to see what you get-but be sure to check it regularly (at least daily) as they can die from dehydration in the enclosed space.