F*n rodents....

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TXCrash

TXCrash

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The other day I heard some... nibbling... in my shed behind one of the fridges. This neighborhood has an occasional wild rat problem - figured I'd dig out the live trap and see what I caught.

Fast forward to today: Plugged in the fridge I'd heard the noises behind (it'll be a kegorator once it's working...) - nothing. Pull out the multimeter - nothing at the thermostat. Further investigation revealed the little shat chewed on the wires underneath. I REALLY didn't feel like rewiring a fridge....

Maybe I'll put the little shat in the fridge... Needless to say - live trap or not, this one isn't going home to its friends.
 
I feel your pain man... We had one get in the house and chew a hole in the basin of my dishwasher and through my brewery service. New dish washer and had to pull a new service. Now I am scared to death to go up into that attic in case the little **** chewed through the insulation. Put your hand down in the wrong spot and lights out.
 
Interestingly enough, I have seen ONE mouse in my house. It was a day after my IPA blew it's top in my closet. I don't know if the remnant of that mess was the object of his desire but, I found the coincident interesting. Anyway, I spent 20 minutes in the bathroom trying to corner him with the plunger. Now, he has 'moved in' with our ball python. :) Unfortunately, the snake is on a hunger strike or something and the mouse seems to have settled in nicely... ;)
 
jiggs_casey said:
Interestingly enough, I have seen ONE mouse in my house. It was a day after my IPA blew it's top in my closet. I don't know if the remnant of that mess was the object of his desire but, I found the coincident interesting. Anyway, I spent 20 minutes in the bathroom trying to corner him with the plunger. Now, he has 'moved in' with our ball python. :) Unfortunately, the snake is on a hunger strike or something and the mouse seems to have settled in nicely... ;)
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your PETA efforts are very commendable.
 
We set mouse traps at our office last week. Came in one morning and two are missing?
 
TxBrew said:
We set mouse traps at our office last week. Came in one morning and two are missing?
Click to expand...

That's why I don't use snap traps...

Snap traps depend on a spring strong enough and fast enough to snap the neck. With rats, the traps spring often isn't strong enough - leading to injured but not killed rodents... Not fun.

Live trap + 5 gallon bucket = one last swim
 
jiggs_casey said:
Interestingly enough, I have seen ONE mouse in my house. It was a day after my IPA blew it's top in my closet. I don't know if the remnant of that mess was the object of his desire but, I found the coincident interesting. Anyway, I spent 20 minutes in the bathroom trying to corner him with the plunger. Now, he has 'moved in' with our ball python. :) Unfortunately, the snake is on a hunger strike or something and the mouse seems to have settled in nicely... ;)
Click to expand...



I once had a rat give birth to ten babies in my *ineffectual* snake's cage.
 
curtis97322 said:
That's why I don't use snap traps...

Snap traps depend on a spring strong enough and fast enough to snap the neck. With rats, the traps spring often isn't strong enough - leading to injured but not killed rodents... Not fun.

Live trap + 5 gallon bucket = one last swim
Click to expand...

+10. live trap, (possum, rat, bat, monkey, bear,etc), 5 gallon bucket, and carb cleaner.
 
Nahh... 5 gallon bucket and water. Or Co2 works well too and doesn't reek the place up.
 
if you like the cost, and relatively small punch for being 8.5 tons of explosives in an 10.3 ton package. that why we have fision and fusion bombs... a scoech smaller in size and 1000 times more powerful. and 50 years of contamination to boot! (ask japan.)
 
Recycled dead rodent picture:

2113-img_1159.jpg


I've been working on blocking access to my house and have only caught two this year vs the 18 I got the first year.
 
Mouse chewed into a bag of LME sitting on a cart, which fell onto the floor. When the mouse jumped off, it landed in the LME and got stuck.
 
mordantly said:
co2.. i like your thinking. i only have 45# of it laying about.
Click to expand...

It's a semi popular way of putting small animals to sleep whom are destined for the bellies of snakes. When used properly it's one of the most humane methods of euthanasia which are readily accessible to Joe Blow. There are a couple university sites which detail the most effective method.

In short you slowly apply CO2 to an open bucket (around 2 psi) , CO2 displaces air and settles in bucket since it's heavier. Subject drifts off to lala land and if left in bucket for adequate amount of time never wakes up. If you blast too quickly it's less than pleasant (take a big gulp of CO2 to find out why).
 
slingshot and a wall should take care of it when ya catch the little bastard
 
curtis97322 said:
That's why I don't use snap traps...

Snap traps depend on a spring strong enough and fast enough to snap the neck. With rats, the traps spring often isn't strong enough - leading to injured but not killed rodents... Not fun.
Click to expand...

As the saying goes: "The early bird may get the worm, but it's the second mouse that get's the cheese." :D
 
We had an instance here a couple weeks ago.

My wife and I where on the couch watching Youtube videos when she said "Marc, there is a mouse on the couch" very calmly. I looked up, and a little deer mouse was standing on it's hind leggs looking at me from about 4 feet away. I slowly got up and retrieved my bat (even though my first thought was shotgun) and walked toward it slowly. At the last moment it ducked into the couch. I thought "Damn" but I started to remove the cushions and saw it scurry under the hide-a-bed. I pulled out the bed slowly and it stood up and looked at me again. At the last second it ran out from under the couch into the middle of the room. I then plinked him on the head and killed him. The whole time my dogs where frozen waiting (I had told them to freeze). So I got rid of it and released them. They sniffed the area and within 5 minutes, they had sniffed out another one in my furnace room. I got that one too and haven't seen another one since. The next day, I found the reason. The Power company had cut the trees along my street. I have glue traps out and a couple live catch traps. Nothing has touched them though.
 
I'm just glad that my new garage is built well enough that the wood rats can't get in. The old garage, one got in, stole a bunch of tools, then snagged a box of poison sticks. Found it (and the tools) under some boxes a few weeks late.
 
We had some in the house/garage a few years back, but largely thinned out the population. Most recent problem didn't have anything to do with brewing supplies (which have all been tightly sealed), but instead some wee bastards chewed both wiring and hoses to the FUEL TANK on my car (sadly, kept outside). Shortly after, while brewing, a friend saw a mouse run by the garage door, so he watched where it ran to. Prime spot for bait blocks.
 
david_42 said:
I'm just glad that my new garage is built well enough that the wood rats can't get in. The old garage, one got in, stole a bunch of tools, then snagged a box of poison sticks. Found it (and the tools) under some boxes a few weeks late.
Click to expand...

I'm curious as to what his tool selection was. Screwdriver? Wrench?


:drunk:
 
This weekend, my brew buddy and I were about to bottle two batches before going to a Mikkeller tasting (all the Mikkeller single hop IPAs, including the world premiere of three new ones).

As I went down to our brewing room in the basement of our dorm, I saw a shadow running across the hall and into the tiny room where we keep bottles and buckets. My buddy, already in there, had just found a pile of rat sh*t, so we decided to hunt the bastard down. Problem was all the beer crates and stuff made it almost impossible to catch the rat, as it was able to get into even the smallest openings and cavities.
After 30 minutes of hunting, we had to call for help, and another buddy showed up with THE rat hunting tool: a plunger. With that, we soon got hold of the rat (which, by the way, was at least a foot long plut the tail. I kid you not). Next problem was, how to get rid of it. The rat was screaming since we were holding it against the floor with the plunger, and all of us wanted to get it over with asap (well, the rat probably just wanted to break free). We actually had to beat it to death with a bike handlebar, as it seemed inhumane to spend time finding a more efficient tool for the killing. it didn't feel good having to kill it, but just the thought of if it had gained acces to the next room with all our malt got the anger up in us.

Needless to say, a lineup of freshly tapped IPAs was excellent to wash down the experience. Fishes set aside, this was the largest animal I've ever killed (at least on purpose).
 
Great story. And as I'm finishing - i notice the Google ad at the top.. for real! Damn, big brother google is watching!!!

google_ad.gif
 
Hmmm... I've known for a while that something or someone has been taking beers out of the fridge in the garage, they just disappear TOO quickly. I fill it up, then a week later it's empty... I WAS blaming the 7 year old kid next door, but giant rats may be the real culprit.
 
I'm curious as to what his tool selection was. Screwdriver? Wrench?
Click to expand...

Sockets, ratchet, box end wrenches, basically anything that was chromed. The wood rat we've got up here is also called a pack rat.
 
I must be too soft. I can't bring myself to use lethal traps (not a hippy, or anything). I have to use the humane traps, and release the little buggers a little ways away from the house.

The one time I did use a sticky trap, several years back, I felt absolutely horrible - I found the little mouse starving/dehydrating/suffocating to death, with half his head stuck in the goo. Felt so bad that I used a non-toxic cleaner to free him, and let him go. :eek:
 
I remember seeing a dead sewer rat in a drain in the woods when I was a kid. It was so big, I thought it was a dog at first :eek:

I couldn't imagine finding one of those f***ers in my house!
 
growing up in cleveland, we used to catch rats crawling in through the root cellar, and up the ****/sewer pipes. we had a bit of plywood we'd use to corner them when they made their way into the house, then out came the hammers and shillelaghs and it was bloody gore, but no rats, well dead rats... :cross:

edit: when you find traps gone, it means that they were sprung, and the bloody savages carried the victims off and ate em... seriously, mice/rats are cannibal bastards.

[youtube]S_dE0nFYP_4[/youtube]
 
The cat doesn't even have to chase or catch them. The mice and rats can just smell the cat around and will try to avoid the area.
 

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