We have rats in our garage! What to do? - UPDATE!

[marit]

Update:
We got him!!! I bought the Ultra rat Zapper thingi and put it in the garage. It took 4 days but he finally went inside it. I saw the tail coming out. So gross. My DH got rid of it. YAY!!!
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We have rates in our garage. I'm am so freaked out.

In our previous rental we used to have them once and the land lord called an exterminator who came, set up the traps and then came back to collect the corps :barf:

Now we're home owners. I wonder if this is something we can do ourselves. Can we just buy a few traps in home depot? Is there something I'm not thinking about?

Thanks!

[HIU8]

Personally, call a pest control company. They will know how to deal best. We have mice on and off for the past 4 years. Now it's ok. There are times when we catch 12 a month. We have a contract with a pest control company. Plus we sealed places we didn't know were issues.

Do you have food stored in your garage (or garbage)?

[ncat]

We had this problem when we lived in Southern California. We moved our dog food to a metal trashcan with a lid. And put out rat traps and the rat bait (dogs had no garage access). We finally got them out of the garage, but we sometimes heard them on our roof and they ate flowering plants off of our patio.

Apparently palm trees are like rat condos. Rats are one of the few things I don't miss about California!

[marit]

I know not to store food in my garage (from my previous experience in the rental). I didn't understand why they still came (my husband saw one a few days ago) until I realized, I always have a used paper bag (Trader Joe's one) in my garage where I put remnants of food I take out of my car, dryer lint etc.. Oops. Today it was all torn up and eaten.

I saw a "rat zapper" trap on Amazon that got amazing ratings. It's $50, but reusable and gets the job done. I'm tempted.

[DrSally]

Uh, yeah. I bought some payday candybars for DD to try peanuts and I didn't want them in the house around DS. So I put them in a bag in the garage. All torn up and mice droppings all over. Nice. It gets worse. DS left his van door open and DH is inexperienced with driving the kids around. He didn't check to see if the van door was shut AND he left sugar popcorn bag in the car. I was completely repulsed to find the bag ripped open and mouse droppings all over the van. We used mouse bait and after awhile I didn't see anymore mouse droppings. Absolutely no more food in the garage or food refuse containers. Also, I always make sure the van doors are shut.

[ett]

We have traps that do not kill the rats. You put either cheese or peanut butter in the trap to lure them in. It's a container with a door that shuts close so you can't hurt yourself setting it up. Honestly, I would rather release a live mouse than deal with a dead one. (Not that I would be the one doing it. That's DH's job!) It only cost a few dollars for a set of 2 at the hardware store.

[niccig]

We're in SoCal and live in a canyon, so rat central. One got into my car's engine compartment (parked in driveway) and was living in there. I didn't know until it chewed the most expensive part of the car's wiring - cost $1500 to fix. Damn expensive rat.

1. You have to stop up all holes smaller than a quarter.

2. Set traps to catch those that live inside - be very careful setting regular trap as you can break a finger with those. With any trap, you have to dispose of the rat/mice. Unfortunately for me, DH is normally at work when this needs to be done...and I grew up on a farm, so he laughs when I call and tell him he can do it when he gets home...I have dealt with worse. I wear long rubber gloves and use the dog's popper scooper to pick it up and then put it in a garbase bage. I throw the rat/mice and the trap away together - it's only a couple of bucks a trap and I am not taking it out. My parents think I'm so wasteful to not reuse the trap.

3. I have several bait baxes that I have around the yard and I fill them with rat bait - we did have a service do this, until I spoke to a man representing a pest control company at the hardware store - he told me I could buy the special metal key for the boxes and fill it myself, so I do that now. You definitely want to make sure all the holes are stopped up, as you don't want a rat that's eaten bait to then go into the garage to die.

We have none inside the house or garage, so we just try to control the outside population that is in our yard...hard to do much else as neighbours have ivy lawn (rat condos) and we're in the hills. I do want to cut down our palm tree, but DH doesnt' think it'll help much because of our location.

[indigo99]

I'm all for humane catch and release of other animals, but I don't have a problem killing rats in traps. I was told that you really should use traps and not poison though. Other animals will eat the sick or dead mouse/rat and get poisoned themselves. I'd hate to think that I might kill the neighbors cat with my mouse poison.

The pest control guy said that the poison makes them thirsty so they'll go outside looking for water and die there. However, I've heard that they sometimes will curl up and die inside the walls and stink for a long time - which is another reason not to use poison.

You really have to figure out how they're getting in/out of the garage though and close off their entryways. Otherwise, they can just keep coming.

[kellij]

A cat??

[Octobermommy]

We had to get sticky traps after the snap traps didn't work. We had one rat,ughh. We put peanut butter on the trap, turned off the lights, and 2 minutes later he was stuck on the trap. Dh disposed of him.

[JGib]

Get something if you think it is a rat. During our cold winter snap, we were visiting my mother-in-law and parked in the street out front. Well, a nice RAT decided to hitch a ride. On our way home, my check engine light came on. The next day we found lots of droppings near out garage door that goes into the house. I took my car in that day and they found the rat had chewed through some wires WAY down=hard to get to place. It cost us $900?!?!?!? They found rat droppings amongst the wiring. We have pest control, so I called them immediately. Never caught it, but also never saw anymore rat droppings (we do have bait boxes around the house from our rodent pest control service, so he might have met his demise by taking some). Our pest control guy said mice won't get up into cars and chew wires, but I wouldn't take any chances. Get SOMETHING to get the thing before it attacks your car!!!

[indigo99]

G Our pest control guy said mice won't get up into cars and chew wires, but I wouldn't take any chances. Get SOMETHING to get the thing before it attacks your car!!!

I don't know if they'll chew wires, but I had a mouse make a nice nest inside the fan of my car's heater once. He had pulled insulation from inside the hood to pad his new home.

[niccig]

I don't know if they'll chew wires, but I had a mouse make a nice nest inside the fan of my car's heater once. He had pulled insulation from inside the hood to pad his new home.

Yes, they chew wires. A rat did $1500 damage to my car. Chewed the most expensive wiring component in the engine and a buch of other stuff. It was off the road for 2 weeks, and mechanic said we had a rat with expensive taste :nodno:

Car insurance covered it minus deductible. It's common in winter when it's cold as the engine is nice and warm. DH now checks the car engines for any evidence of a rat. Thankfully it didn't get to DH's prius - that would have been much more expensive.

[JGib]

Yes, they chew wires. A rat did $1500 damage to my car. Chewed the most expensive wiring component in the engine and a buch of other stuff. It was off the road for 2 weeks, and mechanic said we had a rat with expensive taste :nodno:

Car insurance covered it minus deductible. It's common in winter when it's cold as the engine is nice and warm. DH now checks the car engines for any evidence of a rat. Thankfully it didn't get to DH's prius - that would have been much more expensive.

As stated a RAT did chew wires in my car. The statement about not chewing wires was about MICE/MOUSE. They are smaller than rats. Now, I don't know if it is true, but that is what our pest control guy said. I would definitely not take a chance...whether it is a RAT or a MOUSE, you need to get rid of it because both will do damage to walls, etc...not to mention they breed like nobody's business!