We have had a little rat family that has taken a liking to our birdseed under the feeders recently. We don't believe in poisoning (as it harms so many other creatures like eagles and owls), didn't want to use kill traps with Buddy in the yard so - we ordered 2 live traps and hubby bought a little square feeder which acts as a bird patio to collect the seed as the birds are a little messy. The birds love it. We added the stove pipe as the rats can't climb it - they previously figured out they could climb up the hanger and over to the feeder. It's not the prettiest but it is effective and we love feeding birds so it is a win for everyone. And two little rat members have been relocated to greener pastures in a nearby park far away from our house. When you live on an island you have rodents such as rats as they come with the Ocean so you do what you have to deal with them. Fortunately, none have ever entered our house and hubby put screens under our sheds to prevent them from nesting under there.
Today is beautiful and the sun is shining but apparently tomorrow and Sunday we are supposed to have a weather "event" with a ton of rain and wind. We never did get our exterior lights up last weekend but it looks like that is out this weekend. Maybe next weekend. There is no rush, we don't actually turn them on until December. We are having friends over for a BBQ and I have told hubby a couple of times about the weather but he insists we are making ribs which are done in the slow cooker then finished on the BBQ. He may be BBQing in a rain jacket :)
Buddy is feeling off today, threw up this morning and hasn't eaten a thing all day. He's always had a delicate stomach so I am not worried. I am sure he will be full of piss and vinegar by morning.
Have a great weekend everyone, rain, snow or sunshine!
Rats - they are my bane . In the HOUSE. Moved in sometime in June, likely when the doors were open. One passed on (all food is in fridge, nothing is left out etc.) The rats have made quite a mess of insulation, ate the plastic pipes on the dishwasher (ruined it basically), left a lot of piles of rat poo, chewed paper, chewed the veiner off several doors at floor level, chewed on the baseboards, chewed on the edge of the iPad case, make noises in the night, ran up the bill buying no kill traps (haven't worked either). I want them gone. I no longer have the doors open unless I have they blocked from floor to half way up. Have not had success at having them leave. Cleaned under anything they can get under, closed off access to underneath shelves, filled in the holes around the water pipes, filled in anything that has space around that can be squeezed through. I really need an end to this story.
ReplyDeleteI'm glad you took a picture to share for the bird feeder / keep the rats off solution.
Joy
Crap that sucks, Mom had the same issues in her trailer house in Cowichan Bay. They are bloody terrible. She had an exterminator come in but she didn't have other animals to worry about
DeleteI quit feeding birds because rats came from a care unit nearby. and cats hung out waiting for birds.
ReplyDeleteYeah, the condo Mom lives in banned feeding birds for the same reason
DeleteHave a lovely time in Alberta! And I like your ingenuity with the rats!!!
ReplyDeleteWe've never had to deal with them like this before but we didn't want to stop feeding the birds as we both love it. The solution seems to be holding (for now anyway lol, they are pretty smart buggers)
DeleteHope Buddy is already feeling better. We never had rat problems in Connecticut, but we had squirrel baffles on every feeder and had to take our big top feeder that extended off our deck indoors every night or the raccoons would steal it and drag it into the woods.
ReplyDeleteBuddy is good today thankfully. We also have the raccoons and squirrels but they tend to hang out in other neighborhoods with the larger trees. Our subdivision is only 15 years old so the trees are much smaller.
Deleteyour idea for your step daughter is a good one. Things that bring experiences are always a win in my opinion. We live by con field so battle field mice-o gross, but we do what we can to prevent and mitigate.
ReplyDeleteWe seem to have a lot less mice although at the wild animal rescue I volunteer at they are all over the place.
DeleteThat's an inspired idea! We don't have a rat problem but the squirrels are terrible for pinching the bird food, doing acrobatics like they've got a starring role in Mission Impossible!
ReplyDeleteHope Buddy feels much better soon! xxx
Yeah the squirrels are here too but mostly in other neighborhoods with larger trees thankfully. Buddy is fine today, just his delicatestomach issues.
DeleteSure hope Buddy is feeling better. We worry about our fur babies as much (or more) than our children sometimes.
ReplyDeleteI've been feeding the birds this winter, no rats but I do have a squirrel visiting. He seems to wait until the birds head out and then he shows up. So I've been leaving him alone. We don't have a lot of rats here in Saskatchewan, thankfully, but we did have some at the farm I was raised on.
Enjoy your preparations and I hope the weather doesn't end up being too wicked!
Buddy's doing much better today thankfully. Squirrels are pests here too but not so much my neighborhood as they like large trees which we don't have, just cedars. My friend has all kinds of squirrel preventative measures lol
DeleteIn Alabama they have something called tree rats. They live in trees and they're not squirrels, although those fancier looking critters are pretty destructive also. When it gets cold, all these varmints look for warm places and they also like to chew on things, including wires inside of cars and wiring inside houses, which causes fires. I'm glad you were able to relocate your invaders. I love your cookie kit idea! So clever!
ReplyDeleteYikes, tree rats! These were tiny little cute things with long tails although they do get considerably bigger. These were more mouse size. Rats ate the wiring out of my Mom's old trailer's furnace, she had to have it totally rewired as they did it over the summer and she didn't realize until fall.
DeleteNo rat problem, I think they all hang out in the neighbours barn with the hay and horsefeed. A bear destroyed my bird feeder last week. Enjoy your time in rat free Alberta.
ReplyDeleteWe never saw any rats here until two years ago...not sure why they moved in. Likely one of the neighbors have a compost, they tend to love those. Alberta loves to say they are rat free...really the rats are too smart to live in the bloody cold!
DeleteClever ideas, both the feeder and the unique gift.
ReplyDelete