Locking Bar Eglu Classic

[Peaches]

Hello folks,

 

I am ashamed to say that I need some help and advice. I've just come back from the empty pen (the girls were free-ranging) and found 3 rats, calm as you like, helping themselves to the pellets that the chooks had scattered out of their hanging feeder and left abandoned on the floor.

 

I scrupulously clean the coop out each day, but generally leave the pellets on the floor thinking the girls would eat them - only they haven't. I then clean these up every few days. In absolute horror at the sight of the rats, I've spent the last hour on my hands and knees sweeping up and collecting all the spare bits but what should I do now to stop this happening again? I've also hammered in a bit of wood in the gap where I saw them escape to, but their pen is large, their run is large (surrounded by 50m electric netting to give some idea of size) so rats could get in at any time when the door to the pen is open ie daylight hours.

 

Help! I need some lessons in pen hygiene...

Edited November 8, 2010 by Guest

[chicken bark]

Other than keeping food tidy I don't think there is much else you can do.

 

I have mine behind electric netting too and dread finding rats.

 

I guess if I do I'd put a few traps around the edge of the netting.

[Egluntyne]

Some advice **here**.

[Tweety]

Egluntyne's advice is, as always, excellent. The only thing I would add is that, according to the chap who successfully got rid of my rat problem, Eradibait is not always effective as the rats have to eat such large quantities of it for it to be fatal. I know that others on the forum have used it and found that it worked ok, but I had no luck with it at all and reluctantly had to resort to traps and poison.

[Peaches]

Very useful, so many thanks.

[Peaches]

Hello, Peoples

 

Left the chooks in their pen first thing this morning as it was very wet outside, when I went back to release them into the main run, spotted something dead on the floor.

 

Being the modern, brave woman I am, I got OH to go and have a look - it was a dead mouse, probably pecked to death by chickens. So not rats but mice . However, have taken on advice in link and am sweeping and cleaning up spilt feed like a fury.

 

Fiona - (I wasn't wearing my glasses is my excuse)

[Peaches]

Just found another dead mouse - blimey, those chickens don't take any prisoners, do they!!

[jackie45]

Yesterday evening I went to tuck the girls up and a rat shot out of the coop. We have put down poison down today. Its always going to be difficult as we have compost heaps and a major river at the bottom of the garden. Don't mind mice but rats are another story.

Jackie

[woffle]

rats are inevitable I think - we have them intermittently.

 

Our neighbour shoots them if he sees any (they dig up under his vegetable patch) or the various neighbourhood cats / terriers tend to keep their numbers down. We just mesh under our compost bins, don't leave food on the floor and make sure that the feeders are setup in such a way that they can't eat from them. Sometimes I'll leave poison down but it's going to be a never-ending cycle unfortunately - we're in the Sussex countryside and are going to be a fact of life, no matter how hard we try and eradicate them.

[Peaches]

Yes, we're surrounded by fields, and leave our garden au naturel for the wildlife and have 2 big compost heaps - it's hard to know what to do.

 

However, I left a half-empty tin of corn on the by the door (up on a high stand, by the way) and brought it in when I remembered. I set it down and came back to it and found two lovely little eyes looking back at me! A field mouse was having a right royal feast. OH kindly let it free in the garden...

[Old Speckled Hen]

I make sure all four compost bins have a double layer of chicken wire underneath so that rats don't get in.

My DH found a large hole underneath one of our sedums in the rockery and was convinced it was rats. The green grain poison was taken and taken and taken and taken. So............ at my suggestion we put a rat trap down baited with jam and in one minute there were TWO mice taken. Well I dug out the rest of the poison that had been taken down as store as I don't mind mice in the garden and couldn't bear the thought of a succession of mice poisoning themselves on the stores.

[Kermit]

OH kindly let it free in the garden...

 

The joys of taking a can outside, getting my socks wet and letting out a mouse. Funny how these huge rats suddenly shrink when I see them... Still I keep saying that 6 inches is....