A couple of years ago, I found a dead rat in our swimming pool (Yes, I have a swimming pool! Be quiet at the back!). I cleaned out the corpse and threw it away. I didn't think much of it until, a couple of months later I cleared another dead rat out of the pool.
At this point, I was beginning to, er, smell a rat. Even so, there wasn't much to do other than know there are rats in the neighbourhood.
Well, then some locals trimmed their palm trees, and we discovered that rats live in palm trees around here, and when the trees get their dead fronds tidied up, the rats need to go and find a new home.
Given that our house is basically made out of holes and cardboard and hasn't been updated by the owners in the last 3 decades, several rats decided that the crawly roofspace in our house would make a lovely home, and moved in. The access seems to be through the garage.
This bothered me more, particularly once they started crapping all through the garage and chewing on things in there, like bike tyres and golf bags.
Thus the conflict began. I didn't want to go full chemical warfare on them, having been told that the odours of rotting rat in the dead space of warm houses in California are less than delightful, so I started trapping them. I think I killed 8 or 10 in total. They learned, they stopped using the floor in the garage and just scuttled into the roof.
I had thought that we were in a period of uneasy peace. The rats in the roof above my office made lots of noise, probably chewing through the electrical cables. They're distracting when I'm trying to focus on work, but they seem to be harmless.
And, as this is a rental that I'm planning on moving out of soon, and given that I've told the landlord more than once that the rats are a problem and they've done nothing, I really don't care about the long term damage to the building...
This was the state of affairs until about a week ago, when for the first time I saw a couple of pieces of rodent shit inside the house. I hoped it was a one-off pass through. But going away for a couple of days last week seems to have started rodent party time.
I came home to discover that a mouse (not a rat) had drowned in the toilet, and there was mouse shit all over the house - in the shower, on the sofa, on the draining board, on my desk.
And once they're inside the house, that means it's time for full on warfare. I don't mind the rats in the roof, but the mice in the kitchen is another matter entirely. I set a rat trap in the kitchen, but a mouse just ate all the bait. So I downgraded to a couple of mouse traps and nabbed one yesterday.
But there are more out there. More mouse crap appeared overnight. There's now mouse poison in three spots around the house and I don't care if that means the place stinks for a while of mouse carcass. There are mouse traps set. I am preparing for some grizzly dead-mouse sights.
But does anyone have any advice? The mice seem to be taking the piss at the moment, and I am very, very bothered by it.
At this point, I was beginning to, er, smell a rat. Even so, there wasn't much to do other than know there are rats in the neighbourhood.
Well, then some locals trimmed their palm trees, and we discovered that rats live in palm trees around here, and when the trees get their dead fronds tidied up, the rats need to go and find a new home.
Given that our house is basically made out of holes and cardboard and hasn't been updated by the owners in the last 3 decades, several rats decided that the crawly roofspace in our house would make a lovely home, and moved in. The access seems to be through the garage.
This bothered me more, particularly once they started crapping all through the garage and chewing on things in there, like bike tyres and golf bags.
Thus the conflict began. I didn't want to go full chemical warfare on them, having been told that the odours of rotting rat in the dead space of warm houses in California are less than delightful, so I started trapping them. I think I killed 8 or 10 in total. They learned, they stopped using the floor in the garage and just scuttled into the roof.
I had thought that we were in a period of uneasy peace. The rats in the roof above my office made lots of noise, probably chewing through the electrical cables. They're distracting when I'm trying to focus on work, but they seem to be harmless.
And, as this is a rental that I'm planning on moving out of soon, and given that I've told the landlord more than once that the rats are a problem and they've done nothing, I really don't care about the long term damage to the building...
This was the state of affairs until about a week ago, when for the first time I saw a couple of pieces of rodent shit inside the house. I hoped it was a one-off pass through. But going away for a couple of days last week seems to have started rodent party time.
I came home to discover that a mouse (not a rat) had drowned in the toilet, and there was mouse shit all over the house - in the shower, on the sofa, on the draining board, on my desk.
And once they're inside the house, that means it's time for full on warfare. I don't mind the rats in the roof, but the mice in the kitchen is another matter entirely. I set a rat trap in the kitchen, but a mouse just ate all the bait. So I downgraded to a couple of mouse traps and nabbed one yesterday.
But there are more out there. More mouse crap appeared overnight. There's now mouse poison in three spots around the house and I don't care if that means the place stinks for a while of mouse carcass. There are mouse traps set. I am preparing for some grizzly dead-mouse sights.
But does anyone have any advice? The mice seem to be taking the piss at the moment, and I am very, very bothered by it.
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