Rat Patrol

Leadchunker

Leadchunker

Undisciplined infidel
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I have to come up with a solution for rat control. I have a killed 15 rats near the chicken coop in the last week. They got into my home made soap supplies stored outside. They have been eating felsnaptha soap, really. I'm using snap traps and peanut butter, which accounts for half the kills. The Crossman pellet rifle has killed the other half. Rats can climb trees with amazing speed. They can't out climb the rifle. The problem with traps is they kill little brown birds in the morning if I don't set them off. Anybody got a recommendation?
 
You probably do not want to hear this, but remove the rat's main food source - the chicken coop. Once that's gone and your continued judicious use of the Crossman, your rat problem will cease.
 
I had considered installing wire around the entire chicken run to prevent the rats from getting in to where the food is located. It worked for the pullet pen, but that is an expense I was hoping to avoid.
 
The pellet rifle has forced me to hone my stalking skills, ha. They will use every shadow they can to keep you from seeing them. I have to go out the front door to get a shot. They head for cover when they hear the back door open.
 
The wire fence will be a waste of your time. If a rat can get his nose in a hole, he'll get his entire body thru. As others have already said, removing his reason to be there is the solution.
 
That bucket trap will be built today. It will cut down on my target practice, but guess I could go to the gun range. I hope the guys at the range want to shoot my pellet rifle.
 
Grits said:
Google bucket rat trap.

They are silent. Deadly. They reset themselves.
Click to expand...
+1 it works better than anything I've seen.
 
Don't waste your time on the wire fence, get some yard cats.
I would like to hear if that bucket trap worked !
 
I'm surprised you don't have possum trouble too, every spring I have to run footholds and DP traps. They like chicken ! The coons like to go after the ducks more.
 
xtp308;n34291 said:
Don't waste your time on the wire fence, get some yard cats.
I would like to hear if that bucket trap worked !
Click to expand...

The bucket trap works great! When Dad's shop cat became ill, she was unable to catch the mice like she once did. I told Dad about the bucket trap and a week or two later, he had trapped upwards of 70 mice. About two inches of water in the bottom is all you need.
 
Rats?! I suggest moving.
 
My grandmother had what she thought where mice chewing at the wiring in her car. So she put rat poison under the hood and took out every squirrel around her house.
 
I keep a Remington 870 by the door. If I hear a possum outside I blast it. I have seen them around my trash cans at the end of the yard but not around my coop, of course my coop is 5 feet from my front door and the porch light illuminates it quite well and the door gets shut at night so there is no way in.(Thank God I live in the middle of nowhere.)
 
The bastards got in my corn supply. I found a nest burned it and been setting a box trap. The box trap isnt deadly. A while back I bored a old 22 I have and made it a shot gun. I shoot rat shot through it and it performs amazingly on most animals out to 30 or 40 ft. Starlings and black birds feel the rath. I've killed one rat with it.
 
Last edited by a moderator:
If you've never used a DP trap, you should look into it for possum and coon control. They work great, bait with a little bit of mackeral or tuna. Safe for your dogs, chickens, kids, etc... The target animal has to reach in to get the bait. Once the trap springs, you can dispatch the catch however you desire. No noise, no mess, no fussing from the wife...
 
Grits;n22431 said:
Google bucket rat trap.

They are silent. Deadly. They reset themselves.
Click to expand...

Beat me to it. I was going to suggest the same. Very cost effective, automatically resets and can kill multiple rats before tending. And tending only requires emptying the bucket and refilling it.
 
Rat Terrier.

Just ask any farmer who has any and they will tell you of how intelligent and tenacious this breed is. And you'll never have a better friend to shadow you than a rat terrier.

Rats and rat terriers simply do not live together in the same space. Problem solved.
 
Tailhunter;n37109 said:
Made one of those bucket traps today. Can't wait to see if it works.
Click to expand...

Do tell if it works for rats. The bastards are after my pigeons and they will kill chicks.
 
Grits;n22431 said:
Google bucket rat trap.

They are silent. Deadly. They reset themselves.
Click to expand...

Bucket rat trap will get squirrels too, just a side benefit :)
 
This is the second night for the bucket trap. No victims yet, but the snap trap got 1 more and the pellet rifle got the other.
 
OK the bucket trap is not doing anything but feeding the rats. The peanut butter is all clean off so I know the center part is spinning. I'm thinking the plastic water bottle is too big. I adjusted the depth of the water thinking it may be too high. Still no victims. I will try cutting the bottle in half and taping it together. This will increase the distance the rats will have to reach to get the peanut butter.
 
You can make your self a simple night vision scope to mount on your pellet gun. Check out you tube for the DIY videos. There a HUGE following of ratters in the UK and the pellet gun and home made night vision scopes are what they use.
 
Some folks said get rid of the chicken coop's food and water supply. They are correct! I had so many rats....kept a tally sheet and killed way over two hundred. I finally moved my chickens in with the goats and let them roam around inside the fence. No more rat problems. Scratch feed cast on the ground for several years now.

Fencing will do no good as the rats will dig tunnels under the fence.

I had good luck with a running water hose placed in rat tunnel holes. Hand loaded 7 1/2 shot in a snub nose .38 kills them as they come out of the holes.

The revolver in the pic below is a K-frame model 12 S&W .38 special for size comparison. The wet rat was last one out of the hole.

163948327.jpg
 
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