Workshop visitors

[nigel jones 5Participant @nigeljones5]

If your anything like me im forever scratching and cutting my hands in the workshop on bits of plate etc. Many rats carry leptospirosis in their usine which dries and enters the body via cuts. (rats pee on everything!). If you get it, and many do in the UK, it can be a very serious thing indeed!

[Enough!Participant @enough]

Posted by Neil Wyatt on 09/02/2015 15:10:28:

at least raccoons don't eat the wires and pipework…

I think they would if it was in their way, Neil. Raccoons completely stripped the aluminum flashing off my garage one night to gain entry. (In the still of the night, we thought we had burglars breaking in and I went downstairs – knees knocking – to confront them). When we looked in daylight they had completely peeled off about a ten foot length.

[Clive HartlandParticipant @clivehartland94829]

Of all the things I hate the most are Squirrels, here they use the fences to travel from the woods to feed in the gardens and wreck bird feeders. It is so bad I buy 2 at a time.

I use the airgun on certain kills but have to be very careful no projectile leaves the property as there are houses all around us. So I end up with a triangle of lawn that is my killing zone, outside that it is safe until the tree rat enters the zone. I have tried spinning covers over the bird baskets, its fun to see a squirrel hanging on for dear life until centrifugal force sends him into space. I replaced the plastic ends of one basket with 2 " thick nylon blocks and they proceeded over time to chew them all away. I sometimes get 4 at a time.They chew off small plants at the base of the stem and take all the green figs off the fig tree before they can ripen.They chew up the front of the bird boxes also. In the orchard where I keep the bees we have Walnut trees and they strip the nuts long before they ripen. We seldom get any nuts. I just do not have time to sit and wait for them.Every year I get Field Mice in the greenhouse and in the summer they live in the hedges of the garden fronts (Cotoneaster) I often see them legging it as I go out in the dark.

Clive

[V8EngParticipant @v8eng]

Do not leave any hide mallets about either, rodents seem to have a taste for hide.

I found one in my shop neatly trimmed around the edges.

Edited By V8Eng on 09/02/2015 18:13:30

[JAParticipant @ja]

They also like paper so don't keep engineering drawings anywhere near mice. This is a good reason for copying drawings as soon as you receive them.

JA

[Dan JonesParticipant @danjones77555]

I have a mouse (although from the amount of mess it's making I wouldn't be surprised if it was a family), in my shed where I keep my 3" Burrell. Ideal place really because the shed is used as a proper garden shed with warm soft fluffy things and plenty to eat (bird food seems to be a favourite, especially peanuts!).

I decided that after a little incident concerning my Burrell and the mouse, a trap should be put down. I did this on Saturday morning. When I checked the trap this afternoon, the thing had disappeared off the face of the earth! Nobody seems to know where it's gone so I can only assume the mouse/mice has run off with it!

Here's what that mouse did!….

The engine is stored with the chimney off and stood up behind the rear wheel, and a couple of long towels over the top of the motion. The mice get on the engine, run over the top of the towels with the bird feed in their mouth and drop it through the chimney saddle into the smoke box! Also, they had managed the pick up the remainder of the coal from the tender and drop it down the chimney, along with some bird feed mixed in!

Dan.

[JonParticipant @jon]

Get yourself a Jack Russel, whatever it is its a gonner.

[JonParticipant @jon]

Get yourself a Jack Russel, whatever it is its a gonner.

[Bob YouldonParticipant @bobyouldon45599]

Evening Jon

Re: Get yourself a Jack Russel, whatever it is its a gonner.

They also make damm fine car anti theft and alarms as well

Regards,

Bob Youldon

[JohnFParticipant @johnf59703]

Brian, yes Fizzy is correct Weil's disease is very dangerouse, I Know of two people who died from contracting it, both farmers and both via rats so take care.

Clive I'm in your camp with the greys it's about time we had a government led eradication policy, it would be difficult and probably impossible to exterminate them but a seriouse dent could be made in the numbers. New Zealand did it with Possum and made a significant difference.

Why am I against grey squirrels? Well I had never heard of giardia, an organism that attacks the human gut, until I went to America some 30 years ago, it is prevalent there in water even and particularly in the countryside and who are the biggest carriers, you guessed squirrels! In recent times this has been mentioned in the UK. For the first 40 years of my life I never heard of this here and have many times in my youth drank water from springs in our countryside with no ill effects. Would I do this now— emphatic NO!

Just my opinion as a countryman John

Now I'll duck methinks !

[Bill PudneyParticipant @billpudney37759]

When I was growing up in Southampton, in the 50s and 60s the local council had a bounty on grey squirrel tails. It may have been 1/6 per tail. As a result some friends and I decided to build some crossbows, none of your girly things, these had a rear spring leaf (from an old Morris), used 1/8 diameter bowden cable as the bowstring, and one of the team made the trigger mechanisms. The bolts were 1/4 diameter steel tube(!!) with a sort of turned point and al.alloy fins. On testing the bolts went clean through a galvanised iron dustbin and stuck into a brick wall about an inch or so. All that from about 30 feet.

We used to wander around Southampton Common with these thing cocked and loaded, unbelieveably dangerous, we would probably be locked up these days. As far as I know the only time that a squirrel was dispatched was by me, the late squirrel was about 10 or 15 feet up a tree and could not be "got at" to claim the bounty, it's probably still there.

So it's not a new thing that grey squirrels are a pest………..

cheers

Bill

[Ian S CParticipant @iansc]

For mice I have a trap, it's a bock of wood about 4" square x about 1 1/2" high with a hole in each corner, and the 4 spring mechanisims on the top, mouse puts head in one of the corner holes to get at the bait, bang, a wire loop comes up around the neck, no mouse worries. I'v often caught 4 mice at a setting. Have not had a mouse problem here for many years.

Bigger animals; .22 bird shot works well, them comes .22 long rifle.

For Possums there are a number of different types of trap, they all seem effective. At our museum at Homebush we nearly had a disaster when a Possum chewed through the insulation on the main power inlet line for the museum, we later shot a Possum with a well singed face.

It's common for introduced animals to become pests as they have been removed from their natural preditors, and in NZ all animals(except 2 species of Bats[very rare]) are introduced, NZ was a land of birds, but the collinists imported a lot of British birds too.

Ian S C

[Bob Brown 1Participant @bobbrown1]

I suppose one thing to do is to ensure the little beasties can not get in but mice only need a small hole about the size of a pencil, knot hole springs to mind in timber buildings. Rats can gnaw their way in and will create runs within the structure of a building, I have seen it where they have made a hole in 8" beam, concrete will only slow them down, as rodents need to gnaw all the time to keep their teeth in good condition anything is game apart from metal.

We only have red squirrels here so they are less of a problem more trouble with foxes and badgers, a fox was trying to make a den under the shed and a badger dug a 12" hole in the front lawn. See foxes most days and the occasional badger just wandering about, mice and rats get caught by our three moggies so they do not stand much of a chance as all three are good at their job.

The giardia parasite is not restricted to squirrels it is also carried by dogs, cats, rats etc and humanist is also found in the soil, water and on surfaces we may touch.

Bob

[Phil WhitleyParticipant @philwhitley94135]

Hi Chaps, just a few pointers for getting rid of "unwelcome Guests" in the shed or workshop. First off, rats etc will live within six feet of a food supply if they can, so remove any possible food source, keep dog/bird/pet foods in a metal container with a tight fitting lis, a metal dustbin is ideal if you keep a lot. plastic is useless, they WILL chew through it. Spray any areas that have seen activity/droppings etc with strong smelling disinfectant, I use jeyes fluid diluted and they don't like it. For trapping I use bait boxes, although the problem of them dying in inacessible places is a perrenial one, they work, and the smell only lasts a couple of weeks. Find where they are getting in and block it up. Clear any piles of junk or rubbish and have a really good tidy up inside and out, rats especially dont like having no "cover" they can quickly dart into. You can buy animal safe rat poison if you have pets, it is made from ground up maize husks and molasses, and is only poisonous to rodents, so if you have cats or dogs, use that instead of the commercial chemical poisons. If rats are getting in to your property from an adjacent one, like a neighbours/farms who have animals, and arent too careful about how they feed them, have a word, as this quicly can become an Enviromental health issue, although in most areas councils only deal with rats if you pay them, enviromental health rules can be used to get someone to clean up their act if you can show that the rats are coming from there! The reason rats and mice chew cables it that they think they are pipes! they will chew a plastic pipe until they make a tiny pin hole in it, and then drink there. I have replaced miles of Alkathene pipe, especially in old fashioned piggeries which had been gnawed all over the place. Feeding wild birds is a sore point, it is a good thing to do, obviously ( my mother does it, be she also gets rats in the shed!) If you can come up with a way of putting something under the bird feeders to catch the waste food, and recycle or otherwise get rid of it, this helps enormously. If you make them unwelcome enough, and starve them out, they will go looking for easier pickings. If they don't take the hint, poison the little buggers!

Phil

[Neil WyattModerator @neilwyatt]

> If rats are getting in to your property from an adjacent one, like a neighbours/farms who have animals, and arent too careful about how they feed them, have a word, as this quicly can become an Enviromental health issue, although in most areas councils only deal with rats if you pay them, enviromental health rules can be used to get someone to clean up their act if you can show that the rats are coming from there

Our rats were coming over from the Council's bird feeding area! To be fair the Env Health put poison down for free.

Since getting cats we see very few, and they are all dead ones…

Neil

[Enough!Participant @enough]

If they're piling up Neal, there's a book around called "101 Uses For A Dead Cat"

[Harry WilkesParticipant @harrywilkes58467]

My visitor the neighbour's cat

[DMBParticipant @dmb]

Some but not all cats appear to be hunters. I had a cat who brought home a trophy almost daily. Birds and mice sometimes dead sometimes live.Then a spate of chicken carcases.One day she brought back a live rat as long in the body as her.Played with it in back garden.She made it obvious that she wanted to bring it in to the house but I wouldnt let her in. She hooked a claw in its rear end twirled around her head and flung it against garden wall.When I thought it was dead I laid several sheets of newspaper over it to pick it up and drop in dustbin. Went back to Council Yard where cat caught it. The staff said she was always in their yard so its a fair bet thats where she caught rat.
My current moggie doesnt bring home trophies but he sits in long grass and small slugs get in to his long fur then end up on kitchen floor. We find slug slime trails on floor leading to his food bowl.
This has lead me to believe this is how I have had cats that seem off colour for a few days. Their fur could pick up slug pellets which would be ingested when they lick their fur to clean it.

[DMBParticipant @dmb]

I had a shed on a 3 tier brick wall and wooden floor on brick pillars with bare earth under floor. Had to take up floor and concrete over the earth as it was being churned up by rats. Parents kept chickens during last war for eggs and meat. Rats will keep coming back looking for eggs/chhicken food as they can smell where chickens have been kept.

[Boiler BriParticipant @boilerbri]

Same problem here Donkey. Thats why i dont use the forum much now, too frustrating chasing the curser.

Rat droppings are about 3/8" long (10mm). Mice much smaller.

Bri

[Ian S CParticipant @iansc]

During WW2 dad was a Radar mechanic, and I think it was when he was on Barra that they had trouble with rats, One Nissan hut was on a track that the rats used, so they tried blocking them by filling all holes with concrete, the rats soon removed that. Next they mixed the concrete with crushed glass, the rats soon got rid of that. The next thing that was done, it solved the problem, they moved the hut, and let the rats have their way.

Ian S C

[OuBallieParticipant @ouballie]

Donkey, Bri,

If you are using iOS, download the SwiftKey keyboard App as it fixes the problem.

Geoff – Nothing to say

[Bodgit Fixit and RunParticipant @bodgitfixitandrun]

Posted by Bandersnatch on 10/02/2015 22:28:15:

If they're piling up Neal, there's a book around called "101 Uses For A Dead Cat"

 

There's also a book called "Don't Get Mad Get Even. The Cats Revenge. (A Hundred and One Uses For a Dead Human). I have it. It's really funny. I must look it out.

Edited By Bodgit Fixit and Run on 11/02/2015 14:13:43

[Ian S CParticipant @iansc]

Here the sell a electronic device that is supposed to send out a signal that deters all pests from cockroaches to rats, BUT has no effect on domestic pets????

Ian S C

[Neil WyattModerator @neilwyatt]

My wife had an iPhone app that was supposed to deter almost anything, just tap the right icon.

I never noticed any effect, but I think playing with he phone helped distract us from the midge bites.

Neil

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