Young Brown Rat in the garden

This was what I was testing my new camera out on yesterday. We have a colony of brown rats living under the shed so I was trying to capture them on film. This was a young one who climbed up the trellis.

Category:

Pets & Animals

Tags:

• rat
• rattus
• norvigicus
• garden
• shed
• climb
• rodent

[TopazRaven]

If I may ask for some advice, I saw a family of brown rats out eating at my bird feeder this morning. When I looked closer I noticed two burrows. One under a nearby bush and one right next to the bird feeder under some rocks. If i tell my uncle or mom they'll kill them, but I have a dog and rats can also present health problems. Do you know of any ways I could get rid of them without killing them?

[Silvolf]

@TopazRaven You can buy a cage trap that will catch them without hurting them and then take them far away and release them. That's what I did when I had wild mice.

[xgorecatx]

Thank you. :) The only thing now is how we'll catch them, they are too big for the no-kill mouse traps that i bought... :p I guess i could get no kill rat traps, i dont want them to be killed. Thallium is an horrific way to die.

[Silvolf]

I think you can get cage traps that catch rats. Farm supply stores sell them and hardware stores might do.

[xgorecatx]

Wild brown rats have found their way into the glasshouse, only today did i realise they were rats and not mice which is what we thought until i saw one... still, they tend to squeak in excitement when they hear us coming seen as they know they are going to get fed.

Yep, i guess i'll have to plan a non kill capture and a safe release back out into the wild pretty soon and fix that damn glasshouse...

[Silvolf]

I only saw the rats we had someimes, if I sat quietly near the greenhouse they'd come out and eat from the bird feeder.

I wish you luck with capturing yours and fixing the greenhouse!

[TopazRaven]

@PanicMedia2008

Holy crap. Lol. I never would have figured! My pet rats where so gentle and sweet, but then again they are just that. Pets. Not like the wild ones. Luckily I don't have a fish pond. Way to many loose cats in my neigborhood for that.

[PanicMedia2008]

@TopazRaven Yeah they will eat birds. This big one grabbed a sparrow, and im sure it went for a jackdaw a few weeks back, but i wasn't sure. It seemed to run straight into the jackdaw, but it flew off.. Also if you have a pond, rats will eat the fish, ie gold fish (rats are excellent swimmers). They have been known to attack and kill rabbits aswell.

So even though rats look really cute, they are pretty nasty, plus 30% of rats carry disease, like salmonella etc.

[TopazRaven]

@PanicMedia2008

Holy crap. A rat will eat a bird!? 0.0 As far as I know my little friends have moved on and don't live in my yard anymore.

[PanicMedia2008]

@TopazRaven Moth balls, or pepermint oil or the smell of a ferret will get rid of the rats. There are some rats in my next door neighbers garden, under the shed. I liked rats so didnt mind them, but from what i saw earlier, was the big daddy rat at almost 12" long (not incl his tale) run out from under the shed really fast, grabbed a bird off my patio and ran back under the shed with it.

So i have now put chicken wire along the bottom of the fence which stops them snatching the birds.

[TopazRaven]

@Spellcheckeronline

Lol, I could never do that. Especially considering I used to have pet rats.

[Spellcheckeronline]

@TopazRaven  are crazy !! you should kill them

[TopazRaven]

@Silvolf

Ok, thank you! That's actually a good idea. I actually haven't seen them around though so I'm wondering if I spooked them when I was looking around their burrow and they moved on. Plus my mom stopped feeding the birds.