4m x 3m Omlet pen, cube, new auto door still boxed and coop light

[Kenilchick]

At midnight last night I let my dog out before bedtime. The security light came on and I saw an "unidentified running animal" flee away from the eglu run and up and over the fence at the bottom of the garden. The dog went mad.

 

Thing is. It was quite big. A small cat size. Possibly a large squirrel? (they live in the trees at the bottom of the garden). Am I in denial. Was it really a big rat?. Yuk . I store the grub away in a bin each night well before the chickens go to bed.

Could a big rat get through the bars of the run? I am leaving the eglu door open at night so I don't feel guilty about having abit of a lie in.

 

Problem is - we're going away for a few nights tomorrow and a neighbour is looking after the chickens for me. This is the first time we've gone away since getting chickens and to make it easier for the neighbour I was intending to leave the grub up the whole time. I'm worried now that I am going to come back to a plague of rats.

 

Any advice anybody? Should I ask the neighbour to put the grub away at night and put it out again as early as she can the next day?. I was worried they might get hungry without breakfast there ready and waiting.

[Kirstine]

From the time (i.e. night time) I would say more likely a rat, but from your description of it running up and over the fence, it sounds more like a squirrel, or possibly a weasel/stoat. How high is the fence?

Did you get a good look at its running style? Rats scuttle, squirrels bound, and stoats sort of flow.

 

(edited to add - these things always look bigger at night!)

[Kenilchick]

It ran in a straight line on ground by side fence, no bounding like a squirrel really, and vertically up fence at bottom which is 6ft high I think. Never thought of a weasel/stoat. "Flow" sounds like a good description.

Would a weasel/stoat get through the run bars and be a danger to the chickens with the eglu door open?

 

I had had 2 glasses of white wine!!

[Egluntyne]

That sounds more rat like to me.

[Valkyrie]

Hedgehogs can run - an unbelievable fast scuttle and they climb too. Squirrels will quite happily scamper around the loft all night according to our neighbours! But rats are huge - if it is a regular you will get a greasy mark along the walls/fences as they like a regular route. They prefer to keep on the ground but will jump or climb to look for food or escape in a hurry. They also pong.

[ted]

sounds exactly like our rat. Yes they can get in through the bars. I bought a ready baited trap from B+Q and put it on the rats path. It took a few days for the rat to start eating but then the lot dissappeared very quickly. No more rats...

 

You need to take the feed in at night to make sure that they only have the poison as available food.

 

If you can get a good view of the run from the house then it is worth spending a bit of time at dusk watching to see where they go. This will help you site the traps. They have regular routes...

 

good luck

[Gallina]

Rats are bigger than squirrels, so I would suspect a rat.

 

A full-grown rat cannot get through the bars of the run. But it will always find another way in, unless the run is on slabs, leaving an amazingly small hole that you may not even notice.

 

Look under the front door of the Eglu: they usually emerge there. A small round hole is a giveaway: it won't be a mousehole, as mice can get through the bars and don't need to waste time tunnelling.

[ted]

A rat got in through our bars recently and would have thought it was fully grown given the time of year???

[Gallina]

The rats I see are huge: bigger than squirrels. And surely they would not go to the trouble of tunnelling into my Eglu run if they could just squeeze through the bars?

 

Did you actually see the rat get through the bars? They are very sly with their tunnels: sometimes I don't find them until I pick the Eglu up.

 

I just don't see how such substantial, weighty animals (I know the size well, as I am constantly having to remove them from traps) could possibly get through mesh that size.

 

Mice, yes: they can easily get through the bars. Small rats, yes. But not the sort of rats I get! But the rat-catcher did say mine were particularly fine healthy ones (i.e. not sewer rats), so I am willing to be corrected.

[ted]

yes definately watched it scurrying through the bars. It originally tunnelled but I blocked that with paving. I must admit I have seen fatter rats.

 

Found this on t'interweb

 

Can rats really fit through a hole the size of a quarter?

 

Small rats can, large rats cannot.

 

A quarter is just under an inch in diameter (0.96 inches). Not all rats can fit through a hole the size of a quarter. Large rats and overweight rats are too big. But some rats are small enough to fit through -- especially juvenile rats.

 

The smallest diameter hole a small rat might fit through is an important consideration when rat-proofing an outdoor structure against wild rats, and when choosing a cage which will house baby rats. Generally, wire mesh with 1" x 1" holes is considered too large a spacing for young rats, while 1" x 1/2" and smaller dimensions are narrow enough to keep even the smallest rats inside. For rat-proofing an outdoor enclosure the recommendation is usually 1/2" x 1/2" mesh or smaller.

 

From this site

 

http://www.ratbehavior.org/CollapsibleSkeleton.htm

 

Most of the sites say the rat can squeeze through a hole the size of a quarter which is 24.26mm. I think the mesh on my cube is 25ish...so there or there abouts.

 

Sorry... The little gits may be able to breach the defenses...