UKH

And the saga continues! Ratty noises have been louder over the last few days, so I embarked on a new push to find access points today. I have dug down around a back corner between the kitchen and the downstairs bathroom. This was originally a garage which the previous owners converted to a bedroom with ensuite bathroom. This is where much of the ratty noise has been from. 

I found a whole missing brick about 2 layers underground, and as I dig around it more it appears to have no foundation under it. This could become a bigger job as if there are no founds then any blocking up of that gap that we do can just be undermined. 

Urgh, it's a never ending battle!

youtube.com/watch?v=dHwPYze5M9s&

Your garage/kitchen/bog has got no foundations? Rodents could be the least of your worries.

I'd probably chuck loads of poison under the floor and fill in any holes you can.

It only appears to be a short bit just at the corner of the bathroom (former garage). I presume the builders were less careful with a garage?

It's probably just an old single storey lean-too that has been converted, no need for massive foundations if it's sitting on something fairly settled. I have something similar, two courses below the current floor the bricks are just sat on clay. I was concerned about this but it's about 60 years old and there's no sign of movement.

We had one of those once, in a shared student house. I heard a housemate on the phone telling a friend about it, the friend on the other end obviously referenced the song but my housemate had no idea what he was on about and he disappointingly just said "well I don't know what I'm going to do, that's why I'm telling you, in case you've got any tips.....eh? Oh er no I don't know that song" 

Pearl before swine.

Try cramming hole with wire wool then filling with expanding foam - apparently the blighters can't gnaw their way in then.

Don't worry too much about the lack of foundations, quite a few old places are like that. Just be careful about anything that introduces loads of water.... busted drain, blocked gully, overflowing rainwater pipe etc. 

As for the rat, they like eating expanded foam (learnt from that mistake myself) and will gnaw through almost anything, even cement and sand given enough time.

Use conc block or something like that and bed in as thin a cement sand as you can make it, ie get the block to be a tight fit. 

We have found that they don't gnaw through expanded foam. We used it to block the access from our loft to the neighbours and they have never gone for it despite it having been a route they used. 

We dug down further last night and found that the hole actually had the waste pipe from the downstairs toilet at the bottom of it. A load of expanded foam went inside to all wee gaps and then packed in solid with concrete behind it. 

If we have trapped them in, then I expect a day or so of rats going a bit bonkers before they die and then the infestation of bluebottles the week after. Fun times all round!

having blocked up what we think has been the latest access point, ratty is currently sitting in the cupboard under our sink! There was a trap set there to try to catch it if it got in (it's the only place in the kitchen that we can have the bin, so definitely smells to attract it), but it seems to have evaded the trap. The trap was triggered, but ratty alive and well in the cupboard.
Our farmer friend is on his way down to help me, but I don't know at all what we can do! Not going to let the dog get involved though, incase he chases it the wrong way into the house!!

All the fun and games here today!!

I guess you don't really want it under your sink but at least you know where it is.

In a controlled space a terrier or two would be useful but I can imagine, in a kitchen, there are too many places for the rat to hide if it got out of the cupboard.

Good luck.

Dave

Must use his shotgun, nothing else quite hits the spot. 

In the insurance claim, blame all the repairs you need to do on woodworm. Big ones.... 

Not just an infestation of bluebottles but an appalling smell. From my experience with that, I would never use rat poison again - it's also pretty effective at killing neighbourhood cats etc.

He came with a post from an electric fence, so had spike on the end. By the time he got here the rat had got back out of the cupboard and back into the subfloor. Left plenty of droppings behind. 

He also brought bread soaked in bacon fat as extra bait for the traps. Really would prefer to trap it than it die somewhere unaccessible. 

So we will live without a kitchen bin for a wee while and have added an extra trap to that cupboard with the super tempting bait. Hopefully that will do it!

If preping concrete, mix in ground up glass, the rats dont like that at all!

We have never found the smell to be a problem. Just the bluebottles. I guess it just depends where it dies and how well insulated your walls are!

Too late for that now, but one to bear in mind for next time!

I had dozens of rats die in my ceiling in a bungalow in Arabia. The place had to be gutted before it was habitable again, which took at least a month.

Melted snickers bar smeared over the trigger plate is excellent bait as the little sods can’t grab it & run off with it. 

Peanut butter is my bait of choice for similar reasons. Tahini works if you're missus is too posh for Sunpat.

Cat food or tuna blended into a sloppy paste with olive oil also works a treat. I use dollops of it as bait when shooting them with the air rifle around my chicken run as they have to stay still to eat it. 

I would expect they are coming through the redundant plumbing from the old toilet. We once had a similar thing, called Welsh Water and they lined the sewer with fiberglass to cover the old holes. Solved it straight away with no cost to us. 

You should change your name to The Terminator.

Orange Club biscuits were the bait of choice for the last rat man I engaged...

And there was me thinking this thread was about catching rats .........