That A24 trap kit is $200!!!!! I am going to try the Victor electronic rat trap again for $50. Rats have already taken a bite out of my pineapples last year, I cant have them take a $200 bite out of my budget. Now, if they were in the house, that would be a different story
Buy a mesh cage trap and fine tune it. $25 . Wear gloves to keep your scent off the trap, also try spraying with almond essence. If you catch a friendly animal you can release it.
Good video about a really important subject. I wish you had covered the subject of poisoning because of the secondary danger it poses to our domestic animal friends. The trap is clever but pretty pricey for most suburban gardeners.
My Grandfather used to grow lots of mints around the house and barn. He said that rodents hate the smell of it. In the Fall, he used to sickle the mint and sprinkle it in his root cellar and unfinish basement. My girlfriend, at the time, had a mice problem in her RV and when I told her my Grandfather's trick, she sprinkle peppermint oil on the carpet. She said problem solve. Just an old timer's trick. Peace
Yes! My aunt bought fillable teabags and put dried mint, rosemary and any other pungent scented herb and that helped with mice in campers and chipmunks around our property.
Hi Kevin, love your gardening videos and your enthusiasm! You can also make heavy use of NEEM as an organic pesticide. The smell of Neem drives away most pests, including rats and other rodents. So you can use neem cake on the ground - spread it like a compost around your crops, and neem oil on the foliage. For this, mix 10ml neem oil with 1L water, and use it to spray all your crops. Neem will also strengthen your crops so they are less vulnerable to pests.
oh i like that idea.. i normally make neem cake tea (using a 32 gallon plastic garbage can filled with water and add 2-3 tablespoons of neem cake per gallon of water for no more than a day or it will smell rotten. the neem cake tea will also kill fungus gnats)
Also, to keep pests out of the pantry, put stuff like flour, sugar, oats, etc., into sealed glass or thick plastic containers (mice can chew through thin plastic and cardboard). If you are unable to do that, you can also just store those things in the freezer/refrigerator.
The way to end rodents are: 1) find out and stop all ENTRY POINTS/holes so cannot get in; 2) use the world's best trap I design to kill, now with more than 350-400 successful track records, see many of my videos in your own eyes-will upload more if have time. 99% of traps/methods include A24 FAIL, they are only able to kill the dumb ones, not the smart ones, the smart ones HAVE EYES that CAN SEE THERE IS A SMALL Pin/metal TRIGGER MECHANISM INSIDE THE A24 compressed air trap so the SMART ONES WILL NOT RISK THEIR LIVES CLIMB UP and STICK THEIR HEADS INTO THE A24 TO TOUCH THE PINS TO TRIGGER IT, and also AS IN MY VIDEO SAID (I cannot say it out loud their name brand trap to avoid lawsuit so I said A24 trap, u know what I mean LOL), the smart ones ONCE SEE THE DUMB SIBLING'S DEAD BODY lying on the ground next to the A24 trap, they know it's a killing trap to AVOID SO THE FUTURE GENERATION RODENTS WILL NOT EAT FOOD FROM A24 thus making it fail lol! I did extensive R&D work to design my own trap, and soon design a repeatable trap that kills UNLIMITED QTY per night! Subs to my channel, let engineer/we design a true world's best/greatest ever invented trap with more than 350+ successful track records of killing, watch many videos in your own eyes - after I tried almost all 99% of all traps/methods in the market but all fail 1) czcams.com/video/Ku3VJS3VIMU/video.html 2) czcams.com/video/YIvmmvJAbTc/video.html 3) czcams.com/video/jWqLYU9__UU/video.html 4) Kills ANY SIZE of rodents from small mice to over 11-inch huge rats so effective - is killing 320+ rodent success track record good enough? :) czcams.com/video/R4QIoven16E/video.html rodents are smart and HAVE EYES ABLE TO SEE all mechanicals/old VISIBLE TRAPS, I've spent tons of $, time, and energy trying NEARLY ALL PRODUCTS on the market: any food poison including baking soda/plaster (they WON'T EAT it after killing the dumb ones), high voltage electric zapper, Bucket trap, glue, snap trap, etc ALL FAIL, that's why I have to invent the best trap - it HAS TO BE HIGH TECH so they cannot SEE it at all! Subs to get notified when can u buy it from my co.'s website (soon) at a lower price than the high-tech trap u buy from HD or Lowes. And soon I will design a REPEATABLE trap - trust the engineer who tested it to solve his own problems over 100-300x before release to help millions of Americans to end also rodents infestation problems, do not trust most other people who lie/trick/scam u, at least they do NOT design their own product or tested over 350+! HOPE MY R&D WORKS HELP U save tons of $ NOT trust+buy other failed products, thanks me later or get notified to buy the best one:) czcams.com/video/sLDrfhwTU6E/video.html Show u why 99% of all traps fail including A24 b/c they have EYES ABLE TO SEE LOW-TECH PIN/METAL TRIGGER MECHANISM-they're too smart, DO NOT EVEN EAT FOODS on PLASTIC BASED/PAPER LOL: czcams.com/video/V4pTSFSNiHg/video.html
Hi Kevin. I developed a big rat problem because of bird feeders. A whole rat family nested under a big aloe Vera plant and had a party with the bird seed on the ground. I took away the feeders and set traps. Under control now but lesson learned!
We thought we'd have to give up feeding the birds, but discovered hot pepper suet. Birds have few taste buds and aren't bothered by it, but mammals (including rats) won't touch it. We get a variety of birds.
Consider working cats, Ventura County CA has a program called "working whiskers" to place healthy, fixed, immunized, wild/feral cats on properties (homes, ranches, business, etc.) to "chase" the mice away.
@@Gowaduv I use the biodegradable litters, like the pine pellet and corncob based varieties. I have to make sure to remove the solid waste, since it's not a good idea to compost that, but the used litter makes for great mulch for the reasons you described.
I was amazed at how calm he was while filming as well. I wouldn't be able to sleep for a week after that!!! đđ I'll never get rid of rats because my neighbor in the back has a bird feeder at the fence line. Endless food supply. đ They perfer the seeds over my garden so I guess that is a positive.
I have a friend who periodically puts a metal trashcan lid (upside down) filled with fresh coke (the soft drink). He "sets" it in the late evening before he goes home, and checks it in the morning. He keeps going until a few nights pass with no dead rats in the area. Rats love the smell, so they're attracted to it; they love the sweet taste, so they drink a lot of it. But it is fatal to them. So voila, no more rats. They don't live very long, so you'll probably find them laying around. On the positive side, since it is not an actual poison, it doesn't harm the cats in the area (who mostly ignore it, anyway). I've the results at his place, but I've never actually used it because I've never had rats, and it doesn't seem to work on mice.
I live right next to a slough and a bird/wet land preserve. Rats, squirrels, foxes, raccoons - you name it I'm dealing with it. It is nice that occasionally a hawk does catch the rats in our backyard but we've been fairly successful using 2 tablespoons peppermint oil, 1 tablespoon peppermint Dr. Bronner's Soap, and water in a squirt bottles as well as cooking up homemade pepper spray. We alternate spraying each 2-3 times a week to keep all the little critters from digging, eating, and spoiling our garden and fruit trees. We do the bags around the fruit and when we build the garden beds, they will have screens/chicken coup wire etc. Just please PLEASE do not use glue traps or poison especially if you live near wild areas. Glue cause it's cruel and poison because the rat will not die immediately and then it has the potential to be eaten by other animals which will in turn die from the poison, thus polluting the environment - the antithesis of what we love to do as gardeners.
@@jenicepye2997 I spray the mulch and the bed/container and then at night I spray the leaves of the plant to they don't get burnt during the day with the peppermint. As for the pepper spray, only the mulch and border/outside of the bed/container
Pest control is our family business, I've been doing it over 15 years myself and I'll be the first to tell you that steel wool on its own does NOT work my friend. I've seen it hundreds of times where they just pull it out or push it through. If you want to seal those holes with steel wool you have to hold it in place with something ( encapsulate it with spray foam so they have to chew it and they won't or just use PL with some hardware cloth cut nicely with a nice piece of trim ) look at peak termination points on your roof line for access points and under your sinks where you have plumbing entering the building. If a rat catches another rat getting smoked by that auto trap it will never go near it again, you will reduce numbers by about 70 percent with that system. Thanks for this video brother âșïž
That's what I was thinking. I set out 5 snap traps and only ever caught ONE lol. You know the others told their friends... I have huge brown rats. They are bold. Hate them.
@@brittnyrv5087 I used a five gallon bucket just over half full. Float dog food on top, enough to cover the water. Rats think the dog food is a firm surface and they end up drowning. If your rats are really big there are extra tall buckets you can get. I caught five over two nights. Itâs good because you donât have to handle them. Just a big hole, pour out the bucket and cover with dirt. You can always set up a little grave marker if youâre feeling bad about their demise.
To solve rats, and squirrels for that matter, from chewing through the mesh bags.. I make my own bags with metal screening (like you would use in a screen door) and a few paper binder clips. The rats will not chew through! You can easily customize them by size of fruit..I used them to protect tomatoes, mangos and even banana racks...
My rat eliminating strategy, is named, Tank. He is a West Highland White Terrier, heâs a brilliant ratter and has eliminated our rat problem. He is also utterly adorable.
Mineâs named Benji; similarly adorable. Not a Westie; rather, heâs a mix who looks like a blond Cairn terrier. He has been known to walk past a bush, suddenly stick his head in, and emerge with a rat. One quick shake, and problem solved. The whole action is so fast, it takes my breath away because I really wasnât prepared to have to deal with a rat, dead or alive!
I love this idea! Most people jump to the idea of a feral cat but they are basically a nuke to native wildlife. They kill birds and rare mammals indiscriminately. A small dog like a Yorkie on the other hand canât hurt birds, wonât notice most moles or small natives, and I know first hand theyâll dig up and kill any rats that get in very effectively. Not to mention you can train a dog to target or to be called off quickly if they go after something you donât want. Theyâll also poo where you ask, and donât carry toxoplasmosis like cats do. SOOOOO many wins there. A great option to consider
@@k9spot1 I'm a total dog person. Can't stand cats. Didn't know this about these breeds of Terriers you all are talking about. Great to know. Thanx! And, good luck!
Instant mash potatoes are great! You just sprinkle them around in areas you know they go, where it wonât get wet. They eat it and it expands once theyâve ingested it. Yes it kills them
@@tomdeschesne9391 yeah, apparently when they drink water the instant mash expands. Itâs basically the same concept as poison but if another animal gets the rat they wonât get hurt because there is no poison. Rats have no gag reflex. Oh one thing though is be careful if you have chickens, it has the same effect on them as Iâd does the rats, Iâm not sure if it kills them but I wouldnât want to find out
I am so upsetđą. My squash plants was beautiful and just starting to get flowers and open. I have a small fenced yard and something trampled and ate my squash flowers. They were in containers so not on the ground. Do rats eat squash flowers?
So very thankful for the rat snakes here. Today my son and rescued a rat snake from some bird netting I had in my garden (all netting has now been removed!). Once it figured out we were trying to free it, it calmed down and I was able to get all of it cut off the body of the snake, who really seemed quite grateful afterwards, it just lay there letting us look at it (my family all love snakes), and then went back under my house. Rat snakes not only keep the rodent population down, but they also take care of venomous snakes. I live on 5.25 acres of mostly woods and a creek in Georgia.
I have resident 6' long black snakes and yet the rats remain. I told him of he doesnt hunt, he needs to leave. They stay in the same territory generally. Nothing like a red rat snake or grey rat snake
@@BonnieBlue2A we dont have copperheads and I have only seen one rattlesnake in 20 years. however the rattlesnake that I did see was being totally swallowed whole by a black snake
@@cheriekalel9578 Wow, that sounds like Heaven. I am in NC. My neighbor has a nursery, so there are pots, plants, greenhouses, etc. He let the back area return to nature, which I have no problem with, but the piles of brush and dead trees are the perfect haven for rodents. I guess on the plus side, they aren't living with me, lol, just using me as a restaurant. I have several rat snakes, and 1 drop dead gorgeous corn snake, that I see hiding in wait. Crazy how patient they can be. Thanks for your reply. I love happy endings. :)
Such a great information. Thank you. Iâm having rats problems in my garden as well and because of that I have decided to stop growing tomatoes and lots of other veggies. The teeth marks traumatized me!!
Shawn Woods is an epic mouse trap collector here on CZcams and often tests all sorts of live catch traps and traps that dispatches. He might also have some recommendations or good options.
@@nomanejane5766 The rolling log might work for mice, but it doesn't work for rats. Shawn Woods stated that in one of his videos, and I had first hand experience with that as well. Basically, rats are big enough that they can keep their back feet on the edge of the bucket for balance while stretching out over the rolling log to eat the bait off of the rolling log without falling into the bucket.
I recently moved onto acreage in the high desert where there are a lot of rats and mice (the Mesquite pods provide them with plenty of food). I watched a bunch of Shawn's videos so I could figure out what to use to knock down the rodent population. There are so many different types of traps and I wasn't sure what to try. Then I watched one of his videos called 'College Sorority Invaded by Mice' where he was called in to help get rid of the mice. Out of the hundreds or thousands of different types of traps available, what did he use? Snap traps! So I bought a 6 pack of Aegis rat bait stations and 6 Victor Power Kill Rat Traps. I've been baiting them with peanut butter and Nutella, and I've been catching about 1 rat per day. Unfortunately, the mice are too light to set off the Victor Power Kill Rat Traps, so they have been able to eat the bait out of the snap traps. So I just set out some Protecta Mouse Bait Stations that have old fashioned Victor mouse traps inside.
@@carolinerose5743 99% of traps/methods include A24 FAIL, they are only able to kill the dumb ones, not the smart ones, the smart ones HAVE EYES that CAN SEE THERE IS A SMALL Pin/metal TRIGGER MECHANISM INSIDE THE A24 compressed air trap so the SMART ONES WILL NOT RISK THEIR LIVES CLIMB UP and STICK THEIR HEADS INTO THE A24 TO TOUCH THE PINS TO TRIGGER IT, and also AS IN MY VIDEO SAID (I cannot say it out loud their name brand trap to avoid lawsuit so I said A24 trap, u know what I mean LOL), the smart ones ONCE SEE THE DUMB SIBLING'S DEAD BODY lying on the ground next to the A24 trap, they know it's a killing trap to AVOID SO THE FUTURE GENERATION RODENTS WILL NOT EAT FOOD FROM A24 thus making it fail lol! I did extensive R&D work to design my own trap, and soon design a repeatable trap that kills UNLIMITED QTY per night! Subs to my channel, let engineer/we design a true world's best/greatest ever invented trap with more than 350+ successful track records of killing, watch many videos in your own eyes - after I tried almost all 99% of all traps/methods in the market but all fail 1) czcams.com/video/Ku3VJS3VIMU/video.html 2) czcams.com/video/YIvmmvJAbTc/video.html 3) czcams.com/video/jWqLYU9__UU/video.html 4) Kills ANY SIZE of rodents from small mice to over 11-inch huge rats so effective - is killing 320+ rodent success track record good enough? :) czcams.com/video/R4QIoven16E/video.html rodents are smart and HAVE EYES ABLE TO SEE all mechanicals/old VISIBLE TRAPS, I've spent tons of $, time, and energy trying NEARLY ALL PRODUCTS on the market: any food poison including baking soda/plaster (they WON'T EAT it after killing the dumb ones), high voltage electric zapper, Bucket trap, glue, snap trap, etc ALL FAIL, that's why I have to invent the best trap - it HAS TO BE HIGH TECH so they cannot SEE it at all! Subs to get notified when can u buy it from my co.'s website (soon) at a lower price than the high-tech trap u buy from HD or Lowes. And soon I will design a REPEATABLE trap - trust the engineer who tested it to solve his own problems over 100-300x before release to help millions of Americans to end also rodents infestation problems, do not trust most other people who lie/trick/scam u, at least they do NOT design their own product or tested over 350+! HOPE MY R&D WORKS HELP U save tons of $ NOT trust+buy other failed products, thanks me later or get notified to buy the best one:) czcams.com/video/sLDrfhwTU6E/video.html Show u why 99% of all traps fail including A24 b/c they have EYES ABLE TO SEE LOW-TECH PIN/METAL TRIGGER MECHANISM-they're too smart, DO NOT EVEN EAT FOODS on PLASTIC BASED/PAPER LOL: czcams.com/video/V4pTSFSNiHg/video.html
(1) Cats. My two were born and raised outdoors (but are "fixed" and are fed as well as I feed myself!) They make short work of such things - it's scary actually. (2) I agree: peppermint (you can use peppermint extract from the baking aisle mixed with water and sprayed around - also prevents wasps who are just starting to build a home - but won't evict existing bigger wasp nests) - peppermint also repels rodents and I spray it under the hood of my vehicle for that.... (3) I agree: Jack Russell Terrier (or rat terrier) - fierce on varmints (4) keeping rodents OUT .... stuff steel wool into any openings of your home a rodent may squeeze into - they can't / won't chew through steel wool but you can stuff it into tiny crevices. Just don't lock them into the house - you're using it to keep them from coming in.
I had an issue with a cat using my raised beds as a litter box recently. The cat ruined several of my beans and I had to put some mesh up around them to keep it out.
@@SnailHatan oh, absolutely, glue traps are horrific. All sorts of animals get stuck to them accidentally. I assumed people wouldn't count that as a recommended method since Kevin described it as inhumane, but good idea to be explicit.
Glue traps are a horror show. It made the news here a couple of years back about someone who put them in the garden and caught at least a dozen hummingbirds instead of any of the rodents they were trying to get. The image of those birds stuck to the glue is seared in my brain. Glue traps need to be banned outright. Nothing should die that way.
But they are effective. Place them properly to avoid birds. Easy when you are able to THINK Or would you prefer a touch of bubonic plague, or osteoperosis?
@@stevefowler3398 I don't think anything should die in such an inhumane way, including rodents or insects. Snap traps (or whatever they're called) are at least usually quick. When I've had to, I've live trapped mice and released in nearby parks: they didn't come back, and I didn't get the plague or anything else (the bubonic plague is easy to treat now with antibiotics). Just because they're small doesn't mean they don't suffer. Everyone can do what they like. but they should at least be aware of what they're doing. The people who caught all the hummingbirds never realized that the glue traps would attract them, or how horrible the result would be.
The rats in my garden chewed through mesh bags to get to tomatoes. They donât even bother eating the whole thing and eat little sections of all ripening tomatoes, little a-holes lol. I have to use the clamshells strawberries, blueberries, etc. come in at the grocery store. Itâs the only thing thatâs worked so far.
Try tulle from the fabric store and wrap that around your produce. Another gardening show I watch recommended tulle because they don't like getting their toenails caught in it. Just a thought.
Tulle as I learned from another gardening show works great as a deterrent for lots of different critters, Iâve used tulle with success against squirrels!
I buy the large $11 plastic pots with the built in drip tray at Home Depot, and cut the bottom 4-5 inches off the pot with a hacksaw. Then I put the top "ring" portion around my in-ground plants as a shield against rodents, and use the bottom section for planting seedlings or micro-greens, or as a sand/water reservoir in the bottom of my large grow-bags with a pvc pipe extending to the top of the soil for filling with water. The rats can't climb up the plastic ring around my plants since it's too slick, and slants outward toward the top (fortunately I don't have the Aussie-size varmints). My one and only garden plot is lined with hardware cloth to keep out the gophers, but it's not very deep, so I find I'm filling the plastic rings partially with soil to give the plants more room to grow, and since there's no bottom, it acts like a deeper bed. I haven't had any rats dig under the ring which is buried only about an inch deep in the soil.
Regarding glue traps - they are awful. My wife works at a wildlife rehab, and they frequently receive "by catch" or unintended targets stuck on glue traps. Please don't use them. Regarding rat poison - birds of prey and other predators are often found after eating a poisoned rat. They don't usually survive.
My neighbor and I both have rat problem in our backyard gardens/flower beds. He decided to use poison and sure enough i lifted an old stone that had a dry hollow under it. Under there was a large snake vertebrae, full skin (not shed) and 6 dried snake eggs. I was furious. I use an air gun, but need to step up my game as they are becoming more aggressive as of recently. They are eating whole starter vegetable and award contest entering flowers. Thatâs why I am here to figure more tactics.
Glue traps are simply inhumane. Invest in quick and humane traps. I use the Goodnature A24. Very successful, durable, and quick. I know theyâre expensive, but you only need a couple if you take other measures.
My cat got his first catch yesterday and left it for me in front of our porch. A tiny lil mouse. Living in a small town near to the center I kinda expect pests to be around, where ever there is people there are pests. We got some flying rats (seagulls) as well around, fortunately I donât think theyâll eat my crops.
While I agree in humanely dispatching them, it'll interesting to see if the trap continues to work over time. I find with every kind of trap I've ever used, rats come to understand they're dangerous and after you've caught several others will no longer go near the traps. These days my cats and dogs tend to do the job just fine.
I used to have a couple of rats living in my compost pile, but they were content to eat the kitchen scraps I threw in there and leave my garden alone. They actually did me a favor by tilling the compost for me, and they never once tried to enter the house. Mice were another story, but my cats took care of the problem before I even knew the mice were there. The major pests in my garden have been deer, groundhogs, and slugs. The deer I've deterred with scent repellents, sharp stakes behind the fencing, and planting lots of mint, bunching onions, and datura (jimsonweed). The groundhogs I've dealt with using smoke bombs down their burrows. The slugs-- that's an ongoing battle. A lot of slugs moved in since I started using the Back to Eden method, and I've been resorting to hand-to-hand combat with a soap sprayer, Epsom salts, or just crushing them.
LMAO true this haunts my dreams: www.news.com.au/technology/science/giant-rats-could-take-over-earth-in-the-future/news-story/a58de8a87821e5bb849e20b7ef8aa716. Capybaras are cool though.
Last year we had our garden demolished by a family of squirrels and rabbits. The rabbits were easy to get rid of since we found where they were coming in at and blocked it with some rocks. I've seen rats before too and we've had an exterminator come out for the rat traps. But these I think are ground squirrels and they come over the fence and they dig holes up through the ground. It's so frustrating. This year we are building an enclosed garden bed and also laying wire mesh underneath the raised beds. We'll put a screen door on the front to get in and out. I did some research and it said squirrels cannot get in chicken wire that's 1 inch or smaller. So we're using that and we're using the smaller hardware half an inch cloth under the raised beds. I did not want to go too small for the enclosure because I want bees and butterflies to still get in... It's so frustrating. I think honestly the problem would not be so bad if everyone had a garden but in our neighborhood I think we were the only one that has a garden and fruit trees so it's like the animals are going to a restaurant when they see our place... So frustrating... We lost so much food last year because of these pests. I'm not opposed to terminating them since they carry so much disease.
You hit a sore spot, Kevin. I have just been discharged from the hospital. After many tests, the doctors identified the culprit: a bacteria specific to RATS, transmitted by fleas on the rat. Symptoms: delerium, headache, temperature of 104, fever and chills.
@@riskitallcrypto99 1) Covid-19 presents different symptoms. 2) Covid-19 has a specific test. 3) Bacterial infections tend to be more persistent than viral infections, oftentimes requiring either antibiotics or (in cases with drug-resistant bacteria that resists everything) bacteriophage treatment. There's a lot of misinformation and politically-charged disinformation out there. Never get your health information from political sources.
Several years ago I had a mouse infestation after a concrete stair replacement outside disturbed their nest. It was just like your place, they were in EVERYTHING in my cupboards. It was so bad that I would open a cupboard and they were literally sitting there staring at me. (the cats were happy though, they had a blast) I had to throw out all my dry goods and wash the cupboards with bleach. After that I put ALL my dry goods and baking supplies into mason jars.
Adopting feral/homeless cats, who learned how to hunt, is the best way to tackle this problem. Even well fed cats will prey on smaller animals, and rats are deterred by their presence. The wise advice which was already written in the comments, of adding herbs of the mint family throughout your garden, is also highly recommended (I use that and some scattered garlic cloves in order to prevent wild boars from digging in my small garden, it usually works đżđđ).
Catnip is in the mint family. Maybe just have catnip and it will bring all the neighborhood cats over to take care of the rodents (if they aren't too high).
@@kirstenolson776 Only if you want your cats to be high all the time đ, at least the one who are affected by catnip (Some cats are indifferent to it).
@@DorianneSchwarz My cat is unaffected by it. He isn't indifferent to rodents though. He thinks they are toys but he does eventually kill them after he has brought them under the gate into our garden. I would rather he left them in whatever garden he found them. Twice in the past two years he has brought one in the house then let it go so he can chase it. Result, they hid and one was around for about 3 days and the next overnight.
Allowing cats outdoors is cruel. Feral cats can be happy indoors. Outdoor cats roam into neighborâsâ yards, poop, pee, kill birds, make other peopleâs indoor pets crazy when they see the outside cat.
The snakes in our neighbourhood are some of the most deadly in the world (Australia) so I am super concerned about rodents as we have young kids. I keep all our food-waste compost in enclosed tumbler bins or in buried worm farms that have a heavy terracotta plant pot sitting on top. Also keep on top of thickety weeded areas. We found a snap trap with peanut butter works the best. Use two spoons to get the peanut butter out of the jar as they don't like the smell of humans on the trap. Also keep a separate jar of peanut butter with the label ''rat butter'' written on it. That allows me to eat peanut butter out of my own PB jar without contaminating the rat trap butter with my smell. I like your tip about pre-feeding the areas before trapping. Your open woodpiles, cardboard piles and and compost piles would be a big no-no for me, as they are perfect habitat for the Australian Eastern Brown Snake (super deadly and aggressive). Our neighbour had one in the yard only two weeks ago. Shudders. Those of you who have non-venemous snakes are lucky.
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We do have venomous snakes! He is probably further away from any canyon. My school is right next to a canyon and you are right. I was stacking weeds and after only ONE week of piling up, I began putting everything on a wheelbarrow only to find a Red Diamond rattle snake! Just chilling inside the pile - I almostttt grabbed it! Sooo yes San Diego People don't do this.
For anyone in the uk, just a reminder that water voles look very similar to rats, and water voles are protected in the uk which also in decline. So double check and make sure it is a rat and not a vole, I know that only some gardens have voles but just a precaution is better safe than sorry.
Sorry to sound dumb but how would you differentiate? Guessing voles are smaller. We have decking in our garden and rabbits in a hutch/run and saw a rat /vole in Broad day light looking around the hutch :(
@@iscream_123 voles are chubbier/chunkier in body shape their fur is dark brown, you can't see their ears, whereas for mice and rats you can. The last thing is the tail, voles have hairy/fluffy tail and it's much shorter than their body length but for mice and rats their tail is hairless and longer than their body length! Hopes that helps.
We used traps, but they were only partially effective. Best thing we tried was an electric fence. Garden surrounded with hardware cloth and hooked it up to an electric fence generator. No more rats getting into the tomatoes.
I came out to my garden the other day to see my newly planted module sown cabbages chewed and some even pulled out of the ground. This video is very timely!
We have native protected rats in our neighborhood, so we can't try and poison or trap them. I've never got them inside the house but underneath they've chewed out cables and heating pipes so many times. Many of the things you mention are great prevention methods. I've sealed my under-house space using methods like yours. As well as rats, we have possums so my plants suffer terribly (again. protected - so no trapping/poisoning.) I just plant way more of the plants they seem to like so that we all get to eat them. Great info! đ
I am so glad and honestly was hoping, when I saw this video, that you would include footage of the âdrifting ratâ! When you first posted that I rewatched that 100 times. So funny! Your commentary was perfection! đ
Install a Barn Owl nest box. Mount it eight and a half feet above the ground. Mount it on the side of a Barn. Have the entrance face away from prevailing wind. A entrance guard helps to keep squirrels from gnawing the entrance larger. A ledge is nice for young owls to exercise their wings. A horizontal oval entrance is better than a square or circle. 5" x 4.5" to 4.5" x 3.75". The larger the entrance the more predators like other birds, raccoons and opossum can harass and raid the nest. During nesting season in late Winter and Spring Barn Owls feed heavily on mice, voles, rats and rabbits.
We had a rat in our house that took over a month to catch. He was smart and sneaky. My husband finally had to seal the laundry room off and lay traps on every square inch of floor, and the stupid thing still chewed through the drywall trying to get out. It was bold to, he would run across our legs at night while we were sleeping. Ick. Oh and the best part, it came from a old chicken farm and orchard, so it would only eat fresh fruit.
Capsaicin extract is very effective against mammals pests especially if its made from scorpions or reapers. Serrano and habanero capsaicin extract is effective as well you can grow and make it yourself i have effectively used it for a few years now
Steel wool is not that effective i have had them pull steel wool packings out of holes now if you spray it with capsaicin they wont touch it. you should also wear gloves when setting traps so they donât smell like humans
I saw a video of someone putting a large, blown-up balloon into a bucket. They added some kind of seeds (which sat around the edges of the balloon) as bait. When mice tried to get the seed, they popped the balloon and were trapped in the bottom of the bucket, to be released elsewhere.
Do you know anyone that has built a bird house to attract Owls? I always figured that would at least add some kind of stress / difficulty to the cushy rat life. Also I liked the idea of owls since theyâre nocturnal so they will be hunting when the rats are pillaging your garden
We have owls that circulate through our property and neighbors. I'm sure they get some of the rodent population. But, most of rats live and tunnel underground.
Around here, supplying a high perch or 2 for owls helps them to hunt. They hunt silently, you won't hear them if they're on the job. A tall pole is good, as long as there's a good place for their feet. The better the view, the better it works.
THIS WAS AWESOME FOR ME TO SEE TODAY!!! I was just telling my daughter that I have a rat under my porch, I actually finally saw it the other day and have been hoping to find at least a humane way to get rid of it, THANK YOU!! THIS SHOULD BE PERFERCT!!
My neighbor has free range chickens, they throw chicken feed on the ground and have several water sources for the chickens. Unfortunately, you can see the rats jumping around their yard, drinking and eating in broad daylight. There is nothing I can do about that. The rats have wandered into my yard and devastated my gardens this year. I will try your tips but I can't control the neighbor.
Same problem, neighbours just laugh and are rude. I spent money and time creating a lovely garden, they moved in just over a year ago and decided on getting free range chickens (flying ones!) who get in our garden dropping their eggs and poop, their roaming dogs pooping too! No rats for years, now we are destroyed by them digging and eating as they travel about to the chicken food and eggs. Makes me really sad, once it was a peaceful oasis. Would love to get away but costs, involved in the UK now with rent is madness and out of the question. And low housing stock in the area. Pest control came and it just seems to have got worse! I will try the cayenne pepper and Irish soapâŠâŠ.
ThankU for posting this ! Made me feel better immediately. I really enjoy your channel; great content! I've had chickens for bout 5 years now, and only last year I started seeing holes in the coop, but did not put the necessary eradication effort into it that I should have. I put out the Victor electric trap which caught Zero and some snap traps, pellets, bait etc - I've been putting with & without bait snap traps which they are triggering but remain empty. We have several neighborhood cats and a fox that patrol regularly, but the holes are getting bigger & wider! I finally moved the girls out of the coop into the barn with a metal garbage can feeder that I cap each night cuz the holes inside the coop creep me out & the articles say not to fill ground holes until the bait has been down couple of weeks. Just yesterday saw a hole under the foundation of barn directly across from hose spigot smh. I just started baiting sll holes with baking soda & flour, but have seen no visible results yet. I also just noticed a hole in the ceiling of my unused guest room. So yeaaa thankU so much for this video -made me feel better and I am working on mitigating the piles I have lying around outside- it's been freezing here, but been feeling time pressured with spring round the corner. I am seriously considering this product. Do you have any sort of discount code? ThankUu! :D
We had mice digging up my edamame seeds I planted in our high tunnel (an experiment I was doing between tunnel and outdoor planting). There were tiny holes where each seed was - a few missing each day until all the seeds were gone. Luckily, starting them indoors worked better & no damage to the young plants. We have found the droppings like you said, around the exterior of the tunnel where their run is. We have found some really humane traps that look like giant chip clips, but it's a pain to keep checking them. Your device looks like something that would help for sure!!!
We have issues keeping the mice and rats out. Even worse, we have possums, skunks and racoons living in our neighbor's giant cypress trees and detritus down below. They come into the backyard for a snack, sometimes our husky catches them or runs them off (cleaning up a skunk carcass and a skunk-sprayed dog at 3am is not fun). The neighbors won't pick up their mess on their side so we've barricaded the fences as much as possible, replaced the eaten/torn vents on the bottom of the house, close the greenhouse doors every night, and make no more trash piles. That all seems to hold them off. If you do want to feed the birds without fattening up the local rat and mouse population I recommend Nyjer seed. Rodents, squirrels, rats, and possums don't like it and the doves and finches eat it up. Great video and way to stay calm with a rampaging rodent in your house. I probably would have cursed like a sailor.
Never had to deal with rats. I battle mice, groundhogs, raccoons and opossums. Last year I purchased an electric fence from PremierOne that I can just step over. They learned the woods at the back is theirs, the garden is mine and to just move on. That trap is very interesting option will have to look into that for mice, since a one snap trap is not always the best.
We had a problem under our house. I opened the crawlspace and it was all wet underneath, I called my husband and we looked and they had chewed a hole in the drain pipe under the kitchen sink. It not only drained the kitchen sink, but the dishwasher and garbage disposal. It smelled terrible. They chewed two holes in the drain pipe. It was about $8000.00 damage. We have now set up traps around our yard so as to combat the problem. They have eaten my tomatoes. YUCK
Love your videos Kevin! I live in FL. Bought a house that has part of a stream behind it. Noticed some bird seed I left out in a bin was gone when I came back from a brief vacation. I thought maybe squirrels got in my patio . BTW i have a super energetic 11 month old pup who darts right to my patio corner every single time I let her out. I thought she was chasing lizards until one night, I see 2 medium rats, Tokyo drifting across the awning of my patio. I'm like Ooooh My GOD!!! Look at these nasty bastards!!đź đ”đ€đŹđ I felt so bad for yelling at my dog because I thought she was going to knock my table of plants over. She was truly doing her job as a......RAT TERRIER !! đ«¶đŸđ„° Her name is Biscuit and yes she got extra snacks for alerting me about the pests that have been in my yard for these last 4 months. I put the bin of bird seed in the house & the feeder is hanging up on a high narrow pole far from the house. I have work to do: removing leaves & mulch near air conditioner. I wont leave so much water out for the birds. Thank you so very much for this video and tips!!! Keep you posted. I dont want Biscuit to catch them and get exposed to rat cooties but happy she finally let me know what we heard crawling around at night and stinking up my yard & house. Have a Blessed & pest- free 2024!
something was eating my zucchini! I got home from a weekend trip and it looked like little teeth marks, I was FREAKED out! Thought it was mice bc I recently saw a mouse at the HD garden center which is like a block away from my house. I was seriously ready to pull everything and quit gardening all together! Turns out we had a BAD bug infestation (4 separate pests!) and they all burrowed in to one of the zucchini and ate it from the inside out. I'm still watching for signs of rodents, but luckily I haven't seen any so far.
I havenât seen any but I have tent caterpillars eating on my bare root pear and apple trees that I just put in. I am spraying with some Neem oil but Iâm not sure what else to do. I have a rock retaining wall so we could have rodents living in there. I will keep an eye out. Thanks for in the information. I love song birds and have two bird baths that could be a problem and a bird feeder. I will be sure to clean up what falls to the ground.
I live in a single canopy rain forest in Oklahoma, so most of the prevention measures will not work. But two cats, one Jack Russell Terrier and my air rifle gets the job done.
For the house, stuff copper mesh wire in all of the cracks and crevices. This worked for us, but I haven't figured out how to keep them out of my vegetable garden.
A little expensive. I did use a trap jaw one recently. The rat it caught was so big it was growling while trying to move away with the trap clamped on its head.
My neighbours & I share a beautiful, organic garden. They are mostly all mature people from the hippy era, so the mention of "washing vegetables before eating them" is met with a glazed look. There is definitely a rat problem in the garden and I've gently tried to mention that "rats pee as they walk" to no avail. Granted, everyone seems to be fine, but I know that talk of thoroughly washing the vegetables is thought of as almost conventional or the kind of puritanical mind set of their parents in the 1950s. I see people eat things as they're standing in the garden & I can't help but think of all the slugs that have crawled on it the night previous and the rats nibbling on it. It is refreshing to see someone touch on this Bec cause it drives me crazy.
btw, the lid was closed, I was going to pee, looked at it and immediately closed. And I'm glad I looked, because usually, I lift the lid without looking and I just sit. Just fucking imagine, holy shit.
@@CenturianCornelious We have two theories here. This one, because makes sense, or that it was inside the bathroom door and tried to find a way out, ended up climbing the toilet and fell in it (I know it's a little crazy, but it all happened last week and there was another rat, in this case, in my sister's room, that came out of a door, so I don't think I'm reaching too far hahah) The doors of my house are pretty weak and not solid, and rats are my grandma's nightmare. She's going crazy and is already making sure to have all the doors of the house changed đ
last yr I had no idea I had a rat eating my tomatoes until my 90 lb dog jumped into my tomato raised bed and went after it. It was at the end of the season so I pulled all the plants out!! Container gardening this year. Hope it helps
I appreciate your video, but I don't think the average person wants to spend $169.99 on one rat trap, which is what these cost by doing a simple Google search. That's a ridiculous amount of money. And, most people will tell you that you that in order to be successful, you need to set multiple traps, perhaps 4 or 5 or more. I highly recommend the Tomcat plastic snap traps. They cost a little over $5 each, and are much easier to set than the old-fashioned wire and wood snap traps, which are downright dangerous to set at the rat-size (vs. mousetrap size). Also, I appreciate people making comments about catching mice, but mice and rats have very different habits. Rats are harder to trap, because as you mention, they are wary of anything new. Mice are curious by nature, and are easier to catch.
Rats got all my tomatoes and melons last year. They also got in the car and chewed all the wiring two winters ago đ weâve taken away all the bird feeders and have had success with traps đ fingers crossed theyâre few and far between for the rest of the summer đ€đŸ
Good thumbnail. Was watching the older videos, and saw pineapple in your older house. At least part 1, I was wondering when you will make a update video abput pineapple? Love your videos, keep making them.
Cats, our two upstairs keep the inside free of rats even though they try to come up through the walls they donât run around inside. The downstairs inside out side kitty has caught 14 rats in her prime! This does mean we have to lay down some thing on the freshly dug beds to prevent local cats from using them as a fresh litter box, but thatâs not very hard. I just lay down tomato cages on their sides, and whatever other trellising material I have so thereâs not really room for them to dig up the soil until it settles down a bit, and is covered with whatever Iâm growing.
I battle rats every year in the garden mostly due to the surrounding houses not keeping their backyards debris free. I use the snap rat traps and bait them with peanut butter. Mesh netting will not keep rats away as they eat right thru it. Cats won't keep rats away as there is plenty of feral cats around and my own cat is not allowed outside at night(coyotes). My frenchie does keep me alert where the rats might be so we move the traps as needed. Right now the rats are in the tomato plants because they love ripe ones. Just caught one last week!
@@pinschrunner I destroyed all their nesting places (under the deck, chicken coop, juniper bushes, cedar trees), removed food/water sources (chicken feed and water wasnât left out for the night), and then trap trap trap. At night I went out with my Great Dane who is so clumsy and runs like Scooby Doo but he developed a great hate for rats and was awesome at chasing them out of their hiding places. She even hunted two rats down and killed them which was impressive. I have since noticed we have a lot of free range cats on our street so it looks like neighbours are fighting rats that way.
I know of someone hooking up the hose from their shop vac to the exhaust of their truck, blocked every hole they could find except one. stuck the hose in the only exit and put them all safely to sleep. They havenât seen a rat or a new hole since. They have also moved their bird feeders far from the house .
Well rats! Maybe throw some mint and rosemary in your compost pile? Grow mint and or rosemary by your new compost bin in a giant container? The food pantry here in Sachse uses an old IBC Tote tank frame to hold cardboard. When the frame is full the Food Bank truck takes it away for recycling.
In fact, rats are so smart that until I examined my pineapples close up, I didnt know they had been eaten. I walked by them even. They chew one hole in the fruit, get inside, eat the flesh all around the core but not the core and not the crown and not the outside!!! It is a fake pineapple camouflage shell left only!!! They are sneaky. And, they will eat them green when they are hard and tasteless still!!! @epic gardening
I had the same thing happen with tiny desert ground squirrels (they look similar to chipmunks) and a massive fancy pumpkin that I was saving for itâs seeds. I walked by it every day next to my front door only to find about a month later that they had made a hole in the back and had systematically eaten the whole interior, including the seeds, and left me with an untouched shell. đ„Ž
Thank you for your videos. I just found your channel when trying to deal with a rat. I am doing things on a frugal budget and found Dollar Tree wire mesh waste baskets. I am using them over my plants to keep the rat from eating young plants and veggies while I am in the process of getting ridding of the vermin. Additionally, the Dollar Tree lingerie laundry bags can be used to cover fruits or if you knit or crochet - make your own. Thanks again for all the information. đ
I've always used a 50/50 mixture of white vinegar and apple cider vinegar sprayed on areas where they are entering and chewing. I used it on telephone/internet lines and security alarm lines in attics for people in the area. It also helps to locate droppings, which look like black rice and spray around there. If you have an attic, did you check up there to see any possible entry points for your rodent friends?
I've had both pet rats and rat pests in the garden. Rats are dynamic enough to read your body language, they can be conditioned to do tricks. Pet rats generally consider you one big rat. They can be taught to ride on your shoulder, and mine would put their tails around my neck for balence and whuffle in my ear. Pet rats will not spread disease. They've been raised away from things that could make them sick. That said I cleaned their cage enough that I'd know their droppings in my sleep. But to give you an idea of how habituated rats can be. When i moved into my apartment ten years ago and I looked at the empty side yard I caught a rat ducking into a hole in the basement window. It wasn't secured. At all. The landlord used foam to seal the window shut. Years later when squatters left garbage and spoiled food all over and made a huge mess that spilled out into the side yard, rats started burrowing underneath the planters and beds (I'm a container gardener, that side yard gets too messy for me to be 100% convinced its safe to grow in ground and if I have to move I want to be able to move my plants too. When I followed the burrows, it lead right to the SAME exact spot. The same window. And I found a dead rat done in by its handiwork at the end. It had triggered a landslide of dead dry sandy sediment onto it, buried itself and suffocated to death. In the middle of the pile of gravel, dust and sand was a mummified rat. Also i once found a mouse the neighbors had trapped with a glueboard and I can confirm that it is incredibly distressing even though this is your nemesis being tortured here. I tried taking a loose brick and smashing its head and it didn't work because the ground was soft. It was really nightmarish. I just kept smashing and smashing and it would not die. Finally when it went i dropped it glueboard and all into the garbage can and then asked my neighbors to please not leave gluetraps with mice on them in the open. My cat doesn't go down there, but I can imagine someone's cat seeing the mouse and getting stuck on the glueboard and giving someone a huge hassle to groom. I'm not sure about rats, but my cat does a very good job of keeping mice out of my apartment. He's very very good at killing mice and het lets me know when some are skulking around by becoming obsessed with staring at a given area, and then running away when I see him there like he's afraid I'll steal his food. that said he hid his first ever mouse kill and I didn't find it for months. but I know it was him. he kept playing peekabo with me at night in that spot. like he didn't want me to see something. so that's a possibility too. There's also expanding foam you can get, ten to fifteen dollars a can depending on sales and size. That stuff is good insulation anyway. And it is NOT good for animals to chew on that stuff. The dry foam will soak up moisture in their stomachs and just gum up the works in their digestive tract, not a good time.
I had issues with a raccoon. One day she brought her adorable little baby, who got stuck on the neighbors power line. She eventually ripped down the line and severely injured the baby. Then proceeded to drag the baby back and the baby raccoon didnât want to go. It looked like a kid getting pulled under the bed by a monster. Now I havenât seen the trash pandas for awhile and they have kept rats away. Just thought Iâd share this story for entertainment purposes đ
You should consider getting a trail cam! I just got one a few months ago for 15$ at Walmart (sport section hidden behind the counter) itâs so much fun and i bet you could get some cool footage for the channel. Iâm surprised more people donât do it.
Great tips. If one has lots of property locate compost away from everything and periodically dispatch. Or break down and dry up food scraps and spread like fertilizer. It actually helped my garden and no rats. It is hard when they start but doing all your tips really does work. Prayers to it all.
Had a pumpkin with a few bite matks in it, and have been cutting down trees so have lots of dead branches piled up, no mice or rats i don't think but there was a runaway quail living in there must have been surviving off the compost pile, gave me quite a surprise. Have been uploading some CZcams videos of whats going on here in Australia if anyone is interested, not quite epic as rough and out of focus. I am considering doing the apocalypse grow food challenge just to see if i can feed myself off the garden
Forget having a cat. Jack Russell is your best friend. It is no accident when you watch gardening programs all gardeners have a terrier. đ â€ïžđ
This is my first year (successfully) gardening and when I saw bugs and eggs on my tomatoes my first instinct was to burn it with fire because bugs are gross. Except Lady bugs. They are cute. Luckily lady bugs helped! Now if I even see a rat in my garden I still want to burn it with fire! I'm getting rid of my carboard cemetery and will grow even more mints! I hate rats and will pass out at the sight of one. Dead or alive they are nasty!
You are wonderful, a Godsend, this year I have made a hardware cage with firring strips 3' tall and 4'x8' but I have to take it out now, 1/2" grid. growing sunflowers and bell peppers. Last year they attacked in one dawn 2 rows in my front yard full grown 6-7'tall sunflowers, everyone who walked by stopped in amazement daily. Heartbroken, my 90day crop They even obliterated the ba ck chokes, and few scattered seeds everywhere...had nothing left. That's Florida. My leaking a/c and pipes like yours are definitely sources and where they are coming in. Thank you.
Thanks to Automatic Trap for sponsoring, hands down the best rat trap design I've ever seen or tried: www.automatictrap.com/
rats are well and good, but what about.... Deer, Raccoons, Foxes, Turkeys and the occasional wild dog?
OH also bunnies
That A24 trap kit is $200!!!!! I am going to try the Victor electronic rat trap again for $50. Rats have already taken a bite out of my pineapples last year, I cant have them take a $200 bite out of my budget. Now, if they were in the house, that would be a different story
Buy a mesh cage trap and fine tune it. $25 . Wear gloves to keep your scent off the trap, also try spraying with almond essence. If you catch a friendly animal you can release it.
Good video about a really important subject. I wish you had covered the subject of poisoning because of the secondary danger it poses to our domestic animal friends. The trap is clever but pretty pricey for most suburban gardeners.
My Grandfather used to grow lots of mints around the house and barn. He said that rodents hate the smell of it. In the Fall, he used to sickle the mint and sprinkle it in his root cellar and unfinish basement. My girlfriend, at the time, had a mice problem in her RV and when I told her my Grandfather's trick, she sprinkle peppermint oil on the carpet. She said problem solve. Just an old timer's trick. Peace
Yes! My aunt bought fillable teabags and put dried mint, rosemary and any other pungent scented herb and that helped with mice in campers and chipmunks around our property.
That actually does work peppermint the only sent they hate âșïž
This weekend, a friend mentioned that trick.
I have a different mint at every doorstep. Seems to be working. Mint under fruit trees...
I have a different mint at every doorstep. Seems to be working. Mint under fruit trees.
When you said âbecome the pestâ I expected you to show up in a mouse suit in the next shot đ
Hi Kevin, love your gardening videos and your enthusiasm! You can also make heavy use of NEEM as an organic pesticide. The smell of Neem drives away most pests, including rats and other rodents. So you can use neem cake on the ground - spread it like a compost around your crops, and neem oil on the foliage. For this, mix 10ml neem oil with 1L water, and use it to spray all your crops. Neem will also strengthen your crops so they are less vulnerable to pests.
oh i like that idea.. i normally make neem cake tea (using a 32 gallon plastic garbage can filled with water and add 2-3 tablespoons of neem cake per gallon of water for no more than a day or it will smell rotten. the neem cake tea will also kill fungus gnats)
Is neem harmful to caterpillars, butterflies, or hummingbirds?
Also, to keep pests out of the pantry, put stuff like flour, sugar, oats, etc., into sealed glass or thick plastic containers (mice can chew through thin plastic and cardboard). If you are unable to do that, you can also just store those things in the freezer/refrigerator.
Glass or metal
Best bets
And there is a hole in his house somewhere he needs to plug it w steel wool. That sucker was big
I also spray and mop my pantry with ammonia.
Doubly a good idea to limit weevil investigations.
The way to end rodents are: 1) find out and stop all ENTRY POINTS/holes so cannot get in; 2) use the world's best trap I design to kill, now with more than 350-400 successful track records, see many of my videos in your own eyes-will upload more if have time. 99% of traps/methods include A24 FAIL, they are only able to kill the dumb ones, not the smart ones, the smart ones HAVE EYES that CAN SEE THERE IS A SMALL Pin/metal TRIGGER MECHANISM INSIDE THE A24 compressed air trap so the SMART ONES WILL NOT RISK THEIR LIVES CLIMB UP and STICK THEIR HEADS INTO THE A24 TO TOUCH THE PINS TO TRIGGER IT, and also AS IN MY VIDEO SAID (I cannot say it out loud their name brand trap to avoid lawsuit so I said A24 trap, u know what I mean LOL), the smart ones ONCE SEE THE DUMB SIBLING'S DEAD BODY lying on the ground next to the A24 trap, they know it's a killing trap to AVOID SO THE FUTURE GENERATION RODENTS WILL NOT EAT FOOD FROM A24 thus making it fail lol! I did extensive R&D work to design my own trap, and soon design a repeatable trap that kills UNLIMITED QTY per night! Subs to my channel, let engineer/we design a true world's best/greatest ever invented trap with more than 350+ successful track records of killing, watch many videos in your own eyes - after I tried almost all 99% of all traps/methods in the market but all fail 1) czcams.com/video/Ku3VJS3VIMU/video.html 2) czcams.com/video/YIvmmvJAbTc/video.html
3) czcams.com/video/jWqLYU9__UU/video.html
4) Kills ANY SIZE of rodents from small mice to over 11-inch huge rats so effective - is killing 320+ rodent success track record good enough? :) czcams.com/video/R4QIoven16E/video.html rodents are smart and HAVE EYES ABLE TO SEE all mechanicals/old VISIBLE TRAPS, I've spent tons of $, time, and energy trying NEARLY ALL PRODUCTS on the market: any food poison including baking soda/plaster (they WON'T EAT it after killing the dumb ones), high voltage electric zapper, Bucket trap, glue, snap trap, etc ALL FAIL, that's why I have to invent the best trap - it HAS TO BE HIGH TECH so they cannot SEE it at all! Subs to get notified when can u buy it from my co.'s website (soon) at a lower price than the high-tech trap u buy from HD or Lowes. And soon I will design a REPEATABLE trap - trust the engineer who tested it to solve his own problems over 100-300x before release to help millions of Americans to end also rodents infestation problems, do not trust most other people who lie/trick/scam u, at least they do NOT design their own product or tested over 350+! HOPE MY R&D WORKS HELP U save tons of $ NOT trust+buy other failed products, thanks me later or get notified to buy the best one:) czcams.com/video/sLDrfhwTU6E/video.html Show u why 99% of all traps fail including A24 b/c they have EYES ABLE TO SEE LOW-TECH PIN/METAL TRIGGER MECHANISM-they're too smart, DO NOT EVEN EAT FOODS on PLASTIC BASED/PAPER LOL: czcams.com/video/V4pTSFSNiHg/video.html
Hi Kevin. I developed a big rat problem because of bird feeders. A whole rat family nested under a big aloe Vera plant and had a party with the bird seed on the ground. I took away the feeders and set traps. Under control now but lesson learned!
We thought we'd have to give up feeding the birds, but discovered hot pepper suet. Birds have few taste buds and aren't bothered by it, but mammals (including rats) won't touch it. We get a variety of birds.
That's the type of feed we get too. It keeps the squirrels from the feeder.
Consider working cats, Ventura County CA has a program called "working whiskers" to place healthy, fixed, immunized, wild/feral cats on properties (homes, ranches, business, etc.) to "chase" the mice away.
Oh that's pretty cool!
But then theyâll poop in your garden and maybe others gardens which is not fun too
I take my cats' peed on litter and spread it around my raised beds. Works pretty well for rats and squirrels.
@@Gowaduv I use the biodegradable litters, like the pine pellet and corncob based varieties. I have to make sure to remove the solid waste, since it's not a good idea to compost that, but the used litter makes for great mulch for the reasons you described.
Ya don't replace one problem with another. Those cats can quickly become diseased if they are in contact with rats and the fleas that they carry
You stayed so calm while that pest ran around your house.
I was traumatized to the point of being numb LOL
@@epicgardening I would be chasing with a shovel not a camera or cellphone!!!
I was amazed at how calm he was while filming as well. I wouldn't be able to sleep for a week after that!!! đđ I'll never get rid of rats because my neighbor in the back has a bird feeder at the fence line. Endless food supply. đ They perfer the seeds over my garden so I guess that is a positive.
Man didn't he I would be freaking out smh
Honestly I heard exhaustion, as opposed to calm đ€Ł
I have a friend who periodically puts a metal trashcan lid (upside down) filled with fresh coke (the soft drink). He "sets" it in the late evening before he goes home, and checks it in the morning. He keeps going until a few nights pass with no dead rats in the area. Rats love the smell, so they're attracted to it; they love the sweet taste, so they drink a lot of it. But it is fatal to them. So voila, no more rats. They don't live very long, so you'll probably find them laying around. On the positive side, since it is not an actual poison, it doesn't harm the cats in the area (who mostly ignore it, anyway).
I've the results at his place, but I've never actually used it because I've never had rats, and it doesn't seem to work on mice.
I live right next to a slough and a bird/wet land preserve. Rats, squirrels, foxes, raccoons - you name it I'm dealing with it. It is nice that occasionally a hawk does catch the rats in our backyard but we've been fairly successful using 2 tablespoons peppermint oil, 1 tablespoon peppermint Dr. Bronner's Soap, and water in a squirt bottles as well as cooking up homemade pepper spray. We alternate spraying each 2-3 times a week to keep all the little critters from digging, eating, and spoiling our garden and fruit trees. We do the bags around the fruit and when we build the garden beds, they will have screens/chicken coup wire etc.
Just please PLEASE do not use glue traps or poison especially if you live near wild areas. Glue cause it's cruel and poison because the rat will not die immediately and then it has the potential to be eaten by other animals which will in turn die from the poison, thus polluting the environment - the antithesis of what we love to do as gardeners.
Wholeheartedly agree with this.
Lots of good advice!
Glue traps and anticoagulant poisons should not be legal to sell.
Are you spraying your plant with the peppermint?
@@jenicepye2997 I spray the mulch and the bed/container and then at night I spray the leaves of the plant to they don't get burnt during the day with the peppermint. As for the pepper spray, only the mulch and border/outside of the bed/container
Pest control is our family business, I've been doing it over 15 years myself and I'll be the first to tell you that steel wool on its own does NOT work my friend. I've seen it hundreds of times where they just pull it out or push it through. If you want to seal those holes with steel wool you have to hold it in place with something ( encapsulate it with spray foam so they have to chew it and they won't or just use PL with some hardware cloth cut nicely with a nice piece of trim ) look at peak termination points on your roof line for access points and under your sinks where you have plumbing entering the building. If a rat catches another rat getting smoked by that auto trap it will never go near it again, you will reduce numbers by about 70 percent with that system. Thanks for this video brother âșïž
Rats are ridiculously smart.
That's what I was thinking. I set out 5 snap traps and only ever caught ONE lol. You know the others told their friends... I have huge brown rats. They are bold. Hate them.
@@brittnyrv5087 Ya, you have to get pretty creative to win with traps usually, peppermint oil essential oils is a good deterrent though
@@brittnyrv5087 I used a five gallon bucket just over half full. Float dog food on top, enough to cover the water. Rats think the dog food is a firm surface and they end up drowning. If your rats are really big there are extra tall buckets you can get. I caught five over two nights. Itâs good because you donât have to handle them. Just a big hole, pour out the bucket and cover with dirt.
You can always set up a little grave marker if youâre feeling bad about their demise.
@@Dbb27 will squirrels fall for this or do you only put the bucket out at night? (I don't love squirrels but I also don't want to kill them either)
To solve rats, and squirrels for that matter, from chewing through the mesh bags.. I make my own bags with metal screening (like you would use in a screen door) and a few paper binder clips. The rats will not chew through! You can easily customize them by size of fruit..I used them to protect tomatoes, mangos and even banana racks...
Nice idea. I am impressed by this level of effort :)
Gaps in house. Stuff pcs of metal screen in. Then foam up. Hemophiliac rodents wonât chew it.
The excitement from hummingbird to Tokyo Drift rat really brings me a lot of joy from these videos
My rat eliminating strategy, is named, Tank. He is a West Highland White Terrier, heâs a brilliant ratter and has eliminated our rat problem. He is also utterly adorable.
Mineâs named Benji; similarly adorable. Not a Westie; rather, heâs a mix who looks like a blond Cairn terrier. He has been known to walk past a bush, suddenly stick his head in, and emerge with a rat. One quick shake, and problem solved. The whole action is so fast, it takes my breath away because I really wasnât prepared to have to deal with a rat, dead or alive!
I love this idea! Most people jump to the idea of a feral cat but they are basically a nuke to native wildlife. They kill birds and rare mammals indiscriminately. A small dog like a Yorkie on the other hand canât hurt birds, wonât notice most moles or small natives, and I know first hand theyâll dig up and kill any rats that get in very effectively. Not to mention you can train a dog to target or to be called off quickly if they go after something you donât want. Theyâll also poo where you ask, and donât carry toxoplasmosis like cats do. SOOOOO many wins there. A great option to consider
Mine is Rocco, a miniature Schnauzer. He can detect them and find them wherever they hide.
@@k9spot1 I'm a total dog person. Can't stand cats. Didn't know this about these breeds of Terriers you all are talking about. Great to know. Thanx! And, good luck!
A dachshund is another excellent ratter... I work for someone with a dachshund and NOTHING gets past her!!
Instant mash potatoes are great! You just sprinkle them around in areas you know they go, where it wonât get wet. They eat it and it expands once theyâve ingested it. Yes it kills them
Good tip, thanks!
Really?!?!? đłđłđ€đ€đđđđ€šđ€šđ€šđđđ
@@tomdeschesne9391 yeah, apparently when they drink water the instant mash expands. Itâs basically the same concept as poison but if another animal gets the rat they wonât get hurt because there is no poison. Rats have no gag reflex. Oh one thing though is be careful if you have chickens, it has the same effect on them as Iâd does the rats, Iâm not sure if it kills them but I wouldnât want to find out
@@TheMonnxzeTV thanks!
I am so upsetđą. My squash plants was beautiful and just starting to get flowers and open. I have a small fenced yard and something trampled and ate my squash flowers. They were in containers so not on the ground. Do rats eat squash flowers?
I have a little farm, so rodents are always hanging around. Snakes have become my new best friends.
So very thankful for the rat snakes here. Today my son and rescued a rat snake from some bird netting I had in my garden (all netting has now been removed!). Once it figured out we were trying to free it, it calmed down and I was able to get all of it cut off the body of the snake, who really seemed quite grateful afterwards, it just lay there letting us look at it (my family all love snakes), and then went back under my house. Rat snakes not only keep the rodent population down, but they also take care of venomous snakes. I live on 5.25 acres of mostly woods and a creek in Georgia.
I have resident 6' long black snakes and yet the rats remain. I told him of he doesnt hunt, he needs to leave. They stay in the same territory generally. Nothing like a red rat snake or grey rat snake
@@pinschrunner you want to keep that black snake around. They predate on rattlers and copperheads.
@@BonnieBlue2A we dont have copperheads and I have only seen one rattlesnake in 20 years. however the rattlesnake that I did see was being totally swallowed whole by a black snake
@@cheriekalel9578 Wow, that sounds like Heaven. I am in NC. My neighbor has a nursery, so there are pots, plants, greenhouses, etc. He let the back area return to nature, which I have no problem with, but the piles of brush and dead trees are the perfect haven for rodents. I guess on the plus side, they aren't living with me, lol, just using me as a restaurant. I have several rat snakes, and 1 drop dead gorgeous corn snake, that I see hiding in wait. Crazy how patient they can be. Thanks for your reply. I love happy endings. :)
Such a great information. Thank you. Iâm having rats problems in my garden as well and because of that I have decided to stop growing tomatoes and lots of other veggies. The teeth marks traumatized me!!
Shawn Woods is an epic mouse trap collector here on CZcams and often tests all sorts of live catch traps and traps that dispatches. He might also have some recommendations or good options.
the rolling log is an easy one that u can diy, or buy.
@@nomanejane5766 The rolling log might work for mice, but it doesn't work for rats. Shawn Woods stated that in one of his videos, and I had first hand experience with that as well. Basically, rats are big enough that they can keep their back feet on the edge of the bucket for balance while stretching out over the rolling log to eat the bait off of the rolling log without falling into the bucket.
I recently moved onto acreage in the high desert where there are a lot of rats and mice (the Mesquite pods provide them with plenty of food). I watched a bunch of Shawn's videos so I could figure out what to use to knock down the rodent population. There are so many different types of traps and I wasn't sure what to try. Then I watched one of his videos called 'College Sorority Invaded by Mice' where he was called in to help get rid of the mice. Out of the hundreds or thousands of different types of traps available, what did he use? Snap traps! So I bought a 6 pack of Aegis rat bait stations and 6 Victor Power Kill Rat Traps. I've been baiting them with peanut butter and Nutella, and I've been catching about 1 rat per day. Unfortunately, the mice are too light to set off the Victor Power Kill Rat Traps, so they have been able to eat the bait out of the snap traps. So I just set out some Protecta Mouse Bait Stations that have old fashioned Victor mouse traps inside.
@@carolinerose5743 99% of traps/methods include A24 FAIL, they are only able to kill the dumb ones, not the smart ones, the smart ones HAVE EYES that CAN SEE THERE IS A SMALL Pin/metal TRIGGER MECHANISM INSIDE THE A24 compressed air trap so the SMART ONES WILL NOT RISK THEIR LIVES CLIMB UP and STICK THEIR HEADS INTO THE A24 TO TOUCH THE PINS TO TRIGGER IT, and also AS IN MY VIDEO SAID (I cannot say it out loud their name brand trap to avoid lawsuit so I said A24 trap, u know what I mean LOL), the smart ones ONCE SEE THE DUMB SIBLING'S DEAD BODY lying on the ground next to the A24 trap, they know it's a killing trap to AVOID SO THE FUTURE GENERATION RODENTS WILL NOT EAT FOOD FROM A24 thus making it fail lol! I did extensive R&D work to design my own trap, and soon design a repeatable trap that kills UNLIMITED QTY per night! Subs to my channel, let engineer/we design a true world's best/greatest ever invented trap with more than 350+ successful track records of killing, watch many videos in your own eyes - after I tried almost all 99% of all traps/methods in the market but all fail 1) czcams.com/video/Ku3VJS3VIMU/video.html 2) czcams.com/video/YIvmmvJAbTc/video.html
3) czcams.com/video/jWqLYU9__UU/video.html
4) Kills ANY SIZE of rodents from small mice to over 11-inch huge rats so effective - is killing 320+ rodent success track record good enough? :) czcams.com/video/R4QIoven16E/video.html rodents are smart and HAVE EYES ABLE TO SEE all mechanicals/old VISIBLE TRAPS, I've spent tons of $, time, and energy trying NEARLY ALL PRODUCTS on the market: any food poison including baking soda/plaster (they WON'T EAT it after killing the dumb ones), high voltage electric zapper, Bucket trap, glue, snap trap, etc ALL FAIL, that's why I have to invent the best trap - it HAS TO BE HIGH TECH so they cannot SEE it at all! Subs to get notified when can u buy it from my co.'s website (soon) at a lower price than the high-tech trap u buy from HD or Lowes. And soon I will design a REPEATABLE trap - trust the engineer who tested it to solve his own problems over 100-300x before release to help millions of Americans to end also rodents infestation problems, do not trust most other people who lie/trick/scam u, at least they do NOT design their own product or tested over 350+! HOPE MY R&D WORKS HELP U save tons of $ NOT trust+buy other failed products, thanks me later or get notified to buy the best one:) czcams.com/video/sLDrfhwTU6E/video.html Show u why 99% of all traps fail including A24 b/c they have EYES ABLE TO SEE LOW-TECH PIN/METAL TRIGGER MECHANISM-they're too smart, DO NOT EVEN EAT FOODS on PLASTIC BASED/PAPER LOL: czcams.com/video/V4pTSFSNiHg/video.html
(1) Cats. My two were born and raised outdoors (but are "fixed" and are fed as well as I feed myself!) They make short work of such things - it's scary actually. (2) I agree: peppermint (you can use peppermint extract from the baking aisle mixed with water and sprayed around - also prevents wasps who are just starting to build a home - but won't evict existing bigger wasp nests) - peppermint also repels rodents and I spray it under the hood of my vehicle for that.... (3) I agree: Jack Russell Terrier (or rat terrier) - fierce on varmints (4) keeping rodents OUT .... stuff steel wool into any openings of your home a rodent may squeeze into - they can't / won't chew through steel wool but you can stuff it into tiny crevices. Just don't lock them into the house - you're using it to keep them from coming in.
I had an issue with a cat using my raised beds as a litter box recently. The cat ruined several of my beans and I had to put some mesh up around them to keep it out.
Thanks for discussing options that don't harm raptors and other predators of rodents in the food chain.
Huh? Glue traps harm raptors and other predators.
@@SnailHatan oh, absolutely, glue traps are horrific. All sorts of animals get stuck to them accidentally. I assumed people wouldn't count that as a recommended method since Kevin described it as inhumane, but good idea to be explicit.
Glue traps are a horror show. It made the news here a couple of years back about someone who put them in the garden and caught at least a dozen hummingbirds instead of any of the rodents they were trying to get. The image of those birds stuck to the glue is seared in my brain. Glue traps need to be banned outright. Nothing should die that way.
Quit crying đą
But they are effective.
Place them properly to avoid birds.
Easy when you are able to THINK
Or would you prefer a touch of bubonic plague, or osteoperosis?
@@stevefowler3398 I don't think anything should die in such an inhumane way, including rodents or insects. Snap traps (or whatever they're called) are at least usually quick. When I've had to, I've live trapped mice and released in nearby parks: they didn't come back, and I didn't get the plague or anything else (the bubonic plague is easy to treat now with antibiotics). Just because they're small doesn't mean they don't suffer. Everyone can do what they like. but they should at least be aware of what they're doing. The people who caught all the hummingbirds never realized that the glue traps would attract them, or how horrible the result would be.
Glue traps works best for me so Iâm sticking with that (no pun intended) đ
@@stevefowler3398 Osteoporosis? How do rats cause loss of bone density?? lolololololololol
The rats in my garden chewed through mesh bags to get to tomatoes. They donât even bother eating the whole thing and eat little sections of all ripening tomatoes, little a-holes lol. I have to use the clamshells strawberries, blueberries, etc. come in at the grocery store. Itâs the only thing thatâs worked so far.
They're seriously so annoying
They eat right through cloth mesh
Try tulle from the fabric store and wrap that around your produce. Another gardening show I watch recommended tulle because they don't like getting their toenails caught in it. Just a thought.
Tulle as I learned from another gardening show works great as a deterrent for lots of different critters, Iâve used tulle with success against squirrels!
Clever idea with the plastic clamshells as a covering on the tomatoes.
I buy the large $11 plastic pots with the built in drip tray at Home Depot, and cut the bottom 4-5 inches off the pot with a hacksaw. Then I put the top "ring" portion around my in-ground plants as a shield against rodents, and use the bottom section for planting seedlings or micro-greens, or as a sand/water reservoir in the bottom of my large grow-bags with a pvc pipe extending to the top of the soil for filling with water. The rats can't climb up the plastic ring around my plants since it's too slick, and slants outward toward the top (fortunately I don't have the Aussie-size varmints). My one and only garden plot is lined with hardware cloth to keep out the gophers, but it's not very deep, so I find I'm filling the plastic rings partially with soil to give the plants more room to grow, and since there's no bottom, it acts like a deeper bed. I haven't had any rats dig under the ring which is buried only about an inch deep in the soil.
Regarding glue traps - they are awful. My wife works at a wildlife rehab, and they frequently receive "by catch" or unintended targets stuck on glue traps. Please don't use them. Regarding rat poison - birds of prey and other predators are often found after eating a poisoned rat. They don't usually survive.
*Tip* if anything unintended gets stuck in a glue trap pour olive oil all over the stuck areas with time will come unstuck unharmed
I learnt the hard way..caught a bird but got him unglued
I have better results from glue traps.
My neighbor and I both have rat problem in our backyard gardens/flower beds. He decided to use poison and sure enough i lifted an old stone that had a dry hollow under it. Under there was a large snake vertebrae, full skin (not shed) and 6 dried snake eggs. I was furious. I use an air gun, but need to step up my game as they are becoming more aggressive as of recently. They are eating whole starter vegetable and award contest entering flowers. Thatâs why I am here to figure more tactics.
Glue traps are simply inhumane. Invest in quick and humane traps. I use the Goodnature A24. Very successful, durable, and quick. I know theyâre expensive, but you only need a couple if you take other measures.
My cat got his first catch yesterday and left it for me in front of our porch. A tiny lil mouse. Living in a small town near to the center I kinda expect pests to be around, where ever there is people there are pests. We got some flying rats (seagulls) as well around, fortunately I donât think theyâll eat my crops.
Cats should be in a house at all times.
Flying rats = seagulls. Lol. Tree rats = squirrels. Those are my nemeses.
While I agree in humanely dispatching them, it'll interesting to see if the trap continues to work over time. I find with every kind of trap I've ever used, rats come to understand they're dangerous and after you've caught several others will no longer go near the traps. These days my cats and dogs tend to do the job just fine.
not to mention the expense! $200 for a trap
Kevin "There's a Hummingbird Right there" Espiritu đ
I used to have a couple of rats living in my compost pile, but they were content to eat the kitchen scraps I threw in there and leave my garden alone. They actually did me a favor by tilling the compost for me, and they never once tried to enter the house. Mice were another story, but my cats took care of the problem before I even knew the mice were there.
The major pests in my garden have been deer, groundhogs, and slugs. The deer I've deterred with scent repellents, sharp stakes behind the fencing, and planting lots of mint, bunching onions, and datura (jimsonweed). The groundhogs I've dealt with using smoke bombs down their burrows. The slugs-- that's an ongoing battle. A lot of slugs moved in since I started using the Back to Eden method, and I've been resorting to hand-to-hand combat with a soap sprayer, Epsom salts, or just crushing them.
"That's not a rat, this is a rat!" -Every Australian ever
@Tyron Spaulding. When i told an Aussie that they looked like rats, he said NO, those are mice, our rats are big as cats
@@pinschrunner he wasn't wrong!
LMAO true this haunts my dreams:
www.news.com.au/technology/science/giant-rats-could-take-over-earth-in-the-future/news-story/a58de8a87821e5bb849e20b7ef8aa716.
Capybaras are cool though.
And Afrikans...
You brought those verminâs with you from Europe, youâre faults
Kitty's like "Mmm.. fresh!"
I use a drop bucket, and you can ether put water in it that will kill them or you can keep it dry if you want to dispose live.
Last year we had our garden demolished by a family of squirrels and rabbits. The rabbits were easy to get rid of since we found where they were coming in at and blocked it with some rocks. I've seen rats before too and we've had an exterminator come out for the rat traps. But these I think are ground squirrels and they come over the fence and they dig holes up through the ground. It's so frustrating. This year we are building an enclosed garden bed and also laying wire mesh underneath the raised beds. We'll put a screen door on the front to get in and out. I did some research and it said squirrels cannot get in chicken wire that's 1 inch or smaller. So we're using that and we're using the smaller hardware half an inch cloth under the raised beds. I did not want to go too small for the enclosure because I want bees and butterflies to still get in... It's so frustrating. I think honestly the problem would not be so bad if everyone had a garden but in our neighborhood I think we were the only one that has a garden and fruit trees so it's like the animals are going to a restaurant when they see our place... So frustrating... We lost so much food last year because of these pests. I'm not opposed to terminating them since they carry so much disease.
You hit a sore spot, Kevin. I have just been discharged from the hospital. After many tests, the doctors identified the culprit: a bacteria specific to RATS, transmitted by fleas on the rat. Symptoms: delerium, headache, temperature of 104, fever and chills.
@@riskitallcrypto99 because we can easily test for covid to prove if it is or isn't.
@@riskitallcrypto99 1) Covid-19 presents different symptoms. 2) Covid-19 has a specific test. 3) Bacterial infections tend to be more persistent than viral infections, oftentimes requiring either antibiotics or (in cases with drug-resistant bacteria that resists everything) bacteriophage treatment.
There's a lot of misinformation and politically-charged disinformation out there. Never get your health information from political sources.
Oh wow, glad you got treated in time and hope you're okay! Was it the plague?
Wow. I hope youâre fine. You need to test your pets too.
Please get checked for Lyme.
Several years ago I had a mouse infestation after a concrete stair replacement outside disturbed their nest. It was just like your place, they were in EVERYTHING in my cupboards. It was so bad that I would open a cupboard and they were literally sitting there staring at me. (the cats were happy though, they had a blast) I had to throw out all my dry goods and wash the cupboards with bleach. After that I put ALL my dry goods and baking supplies into mason jars.
Adopting feral/homeless cats, who learned how to hunt, is the best way to tackle this problem. Even well fed cats will prey on smaller animals, and rats are deterred by their presence.
The wise advice which was already written in the comments, of adding herbs of the mint family throughout your garden, is also highly recommended (I use that and some scattered garlic cloves in order to prevent wild boars from digging in my small garden, it usually works đżđđ).
Catnip is in the mint family. Maybe just have catnip and it will bring all the neighborhood cats over to take care of the rodents (if they aren't too high).
@@kirstenolson776 Only if you want your cats to be high all the time đ, at least the one who are affected by catnip (Some cats are indifferent to it).
@@DorianneSchwarz My cat is unaffected by it. He isn't indifferent to rodents though. He thinks they are toys but he does eventually kill them after he has brought them under the gate into our garden. I would rather he left them in whatever garden he found them. Twice in the past two years he has brought one in the house then let it go so he can chase it. Result, they hid and one was around for about 3 days and the next overnight.
My landlord wonât let us have a pet, plus my hubby and daughter are allergic to cats (I love them though!).
Allowing cats outdoors is cruel. Feral cats can be happy indoors. Outdoor cats roam into neighborâsâ yards, poop, pee, kill birds, make other peopleâs indoor pets crazy when they see the outside cat.
I dont have rats but its good to know what their bites look like in the garden and if I ever do get them I will look back at this video..ty
I've been having a problem with giant rats, some call them raccoons. They can go through some tomatoes.
The snakes in our neighbourhood are some of the most deadly in the world (Australia) so I am super concerned about rodents as we have young kids. I keep all our food-waste compost in enclosed tumbler bins or in buried worm farms that have a heavy terracotta plant pot sitting on top. Also keep on top of thickety weeded areas. We found a snap trap with peanut butter works the best. Use two spoons to get the peanut butter out of the jar as they don't like the smell of humans on the trap. Also keep a separate jar of peanut butter with the label ''rat butter'' written on it. That allows me to eat peanut butter out of my own PB jar without contaminating the rat trap butter with my smell. I like your tip about pre-feeding the areas before trapping.
Your open woodpiles, cardboard piles and and compost piles would be a big no-no for me, as they are perfect habitat for the Australian Eastern Brown Snake (super deadly and aggressive). Our neighbour had one in the yard only two weeks ago. Shudders. Those of you who have non-venemous snakes are lucky.
We do have venomous snakes! He is probably further away from any canyon. My school is right next to a canyon and you are right. I was stacking weeds and after only ONE week of piling up, I began putting everything on a wheelbarrow only to find a Red Diamond rattle snake! Just chilling inside the pile - I almostttt grabbed it! Sooo yes San Diego People don't do this.
Iâve had an A24 for 18 months. Best trap ever! I catch rats and mice regularly. No more mice in my home!
As an Australian, if you need some pest control, we have some really nice snakes that can deal with rats/mice so easy.
For anyone in the uk, just a reminder that water voles look very similar to rats, and water voles are protected in the uk which also in decline. So double check and make sure it is a rat and not a vole, I know that only some gardens have voles but just a precaution is better safe than sorry.
Sorry to sound dumb but how would you differentiate? Guessing voles are smaller. We have decking in our garden and rabbits in a hutch/run and saw a rat /vole in Broad day light looking around the hutch :(
@@iscream_123 voles are chubbier/chunkier in body shape their fur is dark brown, you can't see their ears, whereas for mice and rats you can. The last thing is the tail, voles have hairy/fluffy tail and it's much shorter than their body length but for mice and rats their tail is hairless and longer than their body length! Hopes that helps.
I think voles always stay near water? Am wrong?
So in the UK they gas your backyard chickens for your safety and fine you for killing a âprotectedâ rodent. Brilliant!
Antechinus, a native rodent in Australia, look very similar to mice/rats too.
Another way of sealing around pipes is to powder glass into cement and fill the hole with it
1:31 "Look up the black plague"
Too soon Kevin, too soon đ„
Haha
Wasnât the rats, itâs was from the fleas the rats carry.
And the bacteria carried by the fleas.
We used traps, but they were only partially effective. Best thing we tried was an electric fence. Garden surrounded with hardware cloth and hooked it up to an electric fence generator. No more rats getting into the tomatoes.
but that can harm other animals like people's pets or baby opossums. Not good.
I came out to my garden the other day to see my newly planted module sown cabbages chewed and some even pulled out of the ground. This video is very timely!
We have native protected rats in our neighborhood, so we can't try and poison or trap them.
I've never got them inside the house but underneath they've chewed out cables and heating pipes so many times.
Many of the things you mention are great prevention methods. I've sealed my under-house space using methods like yours.
As well as rats, we have possums so my plants suffer terribly (again. protected - so no trapping/poisoning.)
I just plant way more of the plants they seem to like so that we all get to eat them.
Great info! đ
Baking soda and cornbread mix. Leave it out and refill when containers when empty. Slow but works long term. Safe for other animals as well.
I'm totally cracking up at the thumbnailđđđ
I am so glad and honestly was hoping, when I saw this video, that you would include footage of the âdrifting ratâ! When you first posted that I rewatched that 100 times. So funny! Your commentary was perfection! đ
Get yourself a Jack Russell! đŸđŸ They kick rat butt and they don't stop!! Nice chair by the way!
My jack just caught one the other day.
Yep! Rat terriers and cats. Rats/mice freak out from the presence of cats.
Install a Barn Owl nest box. Mount it eight and a half feet above the ground. Mount it on the side of a Barn. Have the entrance face away from prevailing wind. A entrance guard helps to keep squirrels from gnawing the entrance larger. A ledge is nice for young owls to exercise their wings. A horizontal oval entrance is better than a square or circle. 5" x 4.5" to 4.5" x 3.75". The larger the entrance the more predators like other birds, raccoons and opossum can harass and raid the nest. During nesting season in late Winter and Spring Barn Owls feed heavily on mice, voles, rats and rabbits.
Our big garden pest is rats with fluffy tails aka squirrels.
We had a rat in our house that took over a month to catch. He was smart and sneaky. My husband finally had to seal the laundry room off and lay traps on every square inch of floor, and the stupid thing still chewed through the drywall trying to get out. It was bold to, he would run across our legs at night while we were sleeping. Ick. Oh and the best part, it came from a old chicken farm and orchard, so it would only eat fresh fruit.
Capsaicin extract is very effective against mammals pests especially if its made from scorpions or reapers. Serrano and habanero capsaicin extract is effective as well you can grow and make it yourself i have effectively used it for a few years now
Steel wool is not that effective i have had them pull steel wool packings out of holes now if you spray it with capsaicin they wont touch it. you should also wear gloves when setting traps so they donât smell like humans
I saw a video of someone putting a large, blown-up balloon into a bucket. They added some kind of seeds (which sat around the edges of the balloon) as bait. When mice tried to get the seed, they popped the balloon and were trapped in the bottom of the bucket, to be released elsewhere.
Do you know anyone that has built a bird house to attract Owls? I always figured that would at least add some kind of stress / difficulty to the cushy rat life. Also I liked the idea of owls since theyâre nocturnal so they will be hunting when the rats are pillaging your garden
Bird feeder will just attract other pests
@@gailc3042 They were suggesting a Bird House for Owls - Owls Will expertly handle a rodent problem!
We have owls that circulate through our property and neighbors. I'm sure they get some of the rodent population. But, most of rats live and tunnel underground.
Typical bird feeders for birds that eat seeds will attract those birdsâ predators like owls and hawks
Around here, supplying a high perch or 2 for owls helps them to hunt. They hunt silently, you won't hear them if they're on the job. A tall pole is good, as long as there's a good place for their feet. The better the view, the better it works.
THIS WAS AWESOME FOR ME TO SEE TODAY!!! I was just telling my daughter that I have a rat under my porch, I actually finally saw it the other day and have been hoping to find at least a humane way to get rid of it, THANK YOU!! THIS SHOULD BE PERFERCT!!
My neighbor has free range chickens, they throw chicken feed on the ground and have several water sources for the chickens. Unfortunately, you can see the rats jumping around their yard, drinking and eating in broad daylight. There is nothing I can do about that. The rats have wandered into my yard and devastated my gardens this year. I will try your tips but I can't control the neighbor.
Wow! Iâd be out of my mind
Same problem, neighbours just laugh and are rude. I spent money and time creating a lovely garden, they moved in just over a year ago and decided on getting free range chickens (flying ones!) who get in our garden dropping their eggs and poop, their roaming dogs pooping too! No rats for years, now we are destroyed by them digging and eating as they travel about to the chicken food and eggs. Makes me really sad, once it was a peaceful oasis. Would love to get away but costs, involved in the UK now with rent is madness and out of the question. And low housing stock in the area. Pest control came and it just seems to have got worse! I will try the cayenne pepper and Irish soapâŠâŠ.
ThankU for posting this ! Made me feel better immediately. I really enjoy your channel; great content! I've had chickens for bout 5 years now, and only last year I started seeing holes in the coop, but did not put the necessary eradication effort into it that I should have. I put out the Victor electric trap which caught Zero and some snap traps, pellets, bait etc - I've been putting with & without bait snap traps which they are triggering but remain empty. We have several neighborhood cats and a fox that patrol regularly, but the holes are getting bigger & wider! I finally moved the girls out of the coop into the barn with a metal garbage can feeder that I cap each night cuz the holes inside the coop creep me out & the articles say not to fill ground holes until the bait has been down couple of weeks. Just yesterday saw a hole under the foundation of barn directly across from hose spigot smh. I just started baiting sll holes with baking soda & flour, but have seen no visible results yet. I also just noticed a hole in the ceiling of my unused guest room. So yeaaa thankU so much for this video -made me feel better and I am working on mitigating the piles I have lying around outside- it's been freezing here, but been feeling time pressured with spring round the corner. I am seriously considering this product. Do you have any sort of discount code? ThankUu! :D
We had mice digging up my edamame seeds I planted in our high tunnel (an experiment I was doing between tunnel and outdoor planting). There were tiny holes where each seed was - a few missing each day until all the seeds were gone. Luckily, starting them indoors worked better & no damage to the young plants. We have found the droppings like you said, around the exterior of the tunnel where their run is. We have found some really humane traps that look like giant chip clips, but it's a pain to keep checking them. Your device looks like something that would help for sure!!!
We have issues keeping the mice and rats out. Even worse, we have possums, skunks and racoons living in our neighbor's giant cypress trees and detritus down below. They come into the backyard for a snack, sometimes our husky catches them or runs them off (cleaning up a skunk carcass and a skunk-sprayed dog at 3am is not fun). The neighbors won't pick up their mess on their side so we've barricaded the fences as much as possible, replaced the eaten/torn vents on the bottom of the house, close the greenhouse doors every night, and make no more trash piles. That all seems to hold them off.
If you do want to feed the birds without fattening up the local rat and mouse population I recommend Nyjer seed. Rodents, squirrels, rats, and possums don't like it and the doves and finches eat it up.
Great video and way to stay calm with a rampaging rodent in your house. I probably would have cursed like a sailor.
Never had to deal with rats. I battle mice, groundhogs, raccoons and opossums. Last year I purchased an electric fence from PremierOne that I can just step over. They learned the woods at the back is theirs, the garden is mine and to just move on. That trap is very interesting option will have to look into that for mice, since a one snap trap is not always the best.
We had a problem under our house. I opened the crawlspace and it was all wet underneath, I called my husband and we looked and they had chewed a hole in the drain pipe under the kitchen sink. It not only drained the kitchen sink, but the dishwasher and garbage disposal. It smelled terrible. They chewed two holes in the drain pipe. It was about $8000.00 damage. We have now set up traps around our yard so as to combat the problem. They have eaten my tomatoes. YUCK
So crazy you made this video. I think I have this issue, just started a couple days ago. Thank you!
Love your videos Kevin!
I live in FL. Bought a house that has part of a stream behind it. Noticed some bird seed I left out in a bin was gone when I came back from a brief vacation. I thought maybe squirrels got in my patio . BTW i have a super energetic 11 month old pup who darts right to my patio corner every single time I let her out. I thought she was chasing lizards until one night, I see 2 medium rats, Tokyo drifting across the awning of my patio. I'm like Ooooh My GOD!!! Look at these nasty bastards!!đź đ”đ€đŹđ I felt so bad for yelling at my dog because I thought she was going to knock my table of plants over. She was truly doing her job as a......RAT TERRIER !! đ«¶đŸđ„° Her name is Biscuit and yes she got extra snacks for alerting me about the pests that have been in my yard for these last 4 months. I put the bin of bird seed in the house & the feeder is hanging up on a high narrow pole far from the house.
I have work to do: removing leaves & mulch near air conditioner. I wont leave so much water out for the birds.
Thank you so very much for this video and tips!!! Keep you posted. I dont want Biscuit to catch them and get exposed to rat cooties but happy she finally let me know what we heard crawling around at night and stinking up my yard & house.
Have a Blessed & pest- free 2024!
something was eating my zucchini! I got home from a weekend trip and it looked like little teeth marks, I was FREAKED out! Thought it was mice bc I recently saw a mouse at the HD garden center which is like a block away from my house. I was seriously ready to pull everything and quit gardening all together!
Turns out we had a BAD bug infestation (4 separate pests!) and they all burrowed in to one of the zucchini and ate it from the inside out.
I'm still watching for signs of rodents, but luckily I haven't seen any so far.
I havenât seen any but I have tent caterpillars eating on my bare root pear and apple trees that I just put in. I am spraying with some Neem oil but Iâm not sure what else to do. I have a rock retaining wall so we could have rodents living in there. I will keep an eye out. Thanks for in the information. I love song birds and have two bird baths that could be a problem and a bird feeder. I will be sure to clean up what falls to the ground.
I live in a single canopy rain forest in Oklahoma, so most of the prevention measures will not work. But two cats, one Jack Russell Terrier and my air rifle gets the job done.
For the house, stuff copper mesh wire in all of the cracks and crevices. This worked for us, but I haven't figured out how to keep them out of my vegetable garden.
A little expensive. I did use a trap jaw one recently. The rat it caught was so big it was growling while trying to move away with the trap clamped on its head.
My neighbours & I share a beautiful, organic garden.
They are mostly all mature people from the hippy era, so the mention of "washing vegetables before eating them" is
met with a glazed look.
There is definitely a rat problem in the garden and I've gently tried to mention that "rats pee as they walk" to no avail.
Granted, everyone seems to be fine, but I know that talk of thoroughly washing the vegetables is thought of as
almost conventional or the kind of puritanical mind set of their parents in the 1950s.
I see people eat things as they're standing in the garden & I can't help but think of all the slugs that have crawled
on it the night previous and the rats nibbling on it.
It is refreshing to see someone touch on this Bec cause it drives me crazy.
I haven't started my garden yet, but I found a RAT IN MY TOILET the other way :D it was TERRIFYING
btw, the lid was closed, I was going to pee, looked at it and immediately closed.
And I'm glad I looked, because usually, I lift the lid without looking and I just sit. Just fucking imagine, holy shit.
WHAT! Scary
Came up the pipes. Generally happens while one is sitting there. Don't worry too much about it.
@@CenturianCornelious We have two theories here. This one, because makes sense, or that it was inside the bathroom door and tried to find a way out, ended up climbing the toilet and fell in it (I know it's a little crazy, but it all happened last week and there was another rat, in this case, in my sister's room, that came out of a door, so I don't think I'm reaching too far hahah)
The doors of my house are pretty weak and not solid, and rats are my grandma's nightmare. She's going crazy and is already making sure to have all the doors of the house changed đ
@@Anzy.99 My uncle got bitten on the @ss that way lol
last yr I had no idea I had a rat eating my tomatoes until my 90 lb dog jumped into my tomato raised bed and went after it. It was at the end of the season so I pulled all the plants out!! Container gardening this year. Hope it helps
I appreciate your video, but I don't think the average person wants to spend $169.99 on one rat trap, which is what these cost by doing a simple Google search. That's a ridiculous amount of money. And, most people will tell you that you that in order to be successful, you need to set multiple traps, perhaps 4 or 5 or more. I highly recommend the Tomcat plastic snap traps. They cost a little over $5 each, and are much easier to set than the old-fashioned wire and wood snap traps, which are downright dangerous to set at the rat-size (vs. mousetrap size). Also, I appreciate people making comments about catching mice, but mice and rats have very different habits. Rats are harder to trap, because as you mention, they are wary of anything new. Mice are curious by nature, and are easier to catch.
Rats got all my tomatoes and melons last year. They also got in the car and chewed all the wiring two winters ago đ weâve taken away all the bird feeders and have had success with traps đ fingers crossed theyâre few and far between for the rest of the summer đ€đŸ
I also got no tomatoes last year. This year I'm using rat birth control + traps. So far, expecting to pick the first tomatoes this weekend.
Good thumbnail. Was watching the older videos, and saw pineapple in your older house. At least part 1, I was wondering when you will make a update video abput pineapple? Love your videos, keep making them.
Working on it!
I have a pineapple farm @Ansar Mehmood
Cats, our two upstairs keep the inside free of rats even though they try to come up through the walls they donât run around inside. The downstairs inside out side kitty has caught 14 rats in her prime! This does mean we have to lay down some thing on the freshly dug beds to prevent local cats from using them as a fresh litter box, but thatâs not very hard. I just lay down tomato cages on their sides, and whatever other trellising material I have so thereâs not really room for them to dig up the soil until it settles down a bit, and is covered with whatever Iâm growing.
Thanks so much for doing this video. It was very helpful! It makes me nervous to think about this problem, but you made me feel less fearful.
I battle rats every year in the garden mostly due to the surrounding houses not keeping their backyards debris free. I use the snap rat traps and bait them with peanut butter. Mesh netting will not keep rats away as they eat right thru it. Cats won't keep rats away as there is plenty of feral cats around and my own cat is not allowed outside at night(coyotes). My frenchie does keep me alert where the rats might be so we move the traps as needed. Right now the rats are in the tomato plants because they love ripe ones. Just caught one last week!
After an all winter war with rats I have finally eradicated them from my yard. Kevin, like this comment for 50% less rats in your garden đ
LIKED
Keep up the good work. They will try to repopulate your area from the surrounding properties.
đ
@Kadri Press. How did you get rid of them?
@@pinschrunner I destroyed all their nesting places (under the deck, chicken coop, juniper bushes, cedar trees), removed food/water sources (chicken feed and water wasnât left out for the night), and then trap trap trap. At night I went out with my Great Dane who is so clumsy and runs like Scooby Doo but he developed a great hate for rats and was awesome at chasing them out of their hiding places. She even hunted two rats down and killed them which was impressive. I have since noticed we have a lot of free range cats on our street so it looks like neighbours are fighting rats that way.
I know of someone hooking up the hose from their shop vac to the exhaust of their truck, blocked every hole they could find except one. stuck the hose in the only exit and put them all safely to sleep. They havenât seen a rat or a new hole since. They have also moved their bird feeders far from the house .
I love the epic garden adrinock chair!!!!
Well rats! Maybe throw some mint and rosemary in your compost pile? Grow mint and or rosemary by your new compost bin in a giant container? The food pantry here in Sachse uses an old IBC Tote tank frame to hold cardboard. When the frame is full the Food Bank truck takes it away for recycling.
In fact, rats are so smart that until I examined my pineapples close up, I didnt know they had been eaten. I walked by them even. They chew one hole in the fruit, get inside, eat the flesh all around the core but not the core and not the crown and not the outside!!! It is a fake pineapple camouflage shell left only!!! They are sneaky. And, they will eat them green when they are hard and tasteless still!!! @epic gardening
I had the same thing happen with tiny desert ground squirrels (they look similar to chipmunks) and a massive fancy pumpkin that I was saving for itâs seeds. I walked by it every day next to my front door only to find about a month later that they had made a hole in the back and had systematically eaten the whole interior, including the seeds, and left me with an untouched shell. đ„Ž
Thank you for your videos. I just found your channel when trying to deal with a rat. I am doing things on a frugal budget and found Dollar Tree wire mesh waste baskets. I am using them over my plants to keep the rat from eating young plants and veggies while I am in the process of getting ridding of the vermin. Additionally, the Dollar Tree lingerie laundry bags can be used to cover fruits or if you knit or crochet - make your own. Thanks again for all the information. đ
I've always used a 50/50 mixture of white vinegar and apple cider vinegar sprayed on areas where they are entering and chewing. I used it on telephone/internet lines and security alarm lines in attics for people in the area. It also helps to locate droppings, which look like black rice and spray around there. If you have an attic, did you check up there to see any possible entry points for your rodent friends?
I've had both pet rats and rat pests in the garden. Rats are dynamic enough to read your body language, they can be conditioned to do tricks. Pet rats generally consider you one big rat. They can be taught to ride on your shoulder, and mine would put their tails around my neck for balence and whuffle in my ear. Pet rats will not spread disease. They've been raised away from things that could make them sick. That said I cleaned their cage enough that I'd know their droppings in my sleep.
But to give you an idea of how habituated rats can be. When i moved into my apartment ten years ago and I looked at the empty side yard I caught a rat ducking into a hole in the basement window. It wasn't secured. At all. The landlord used foam to seal the window shut. Years later when squatters left garbage and spoiled food all over and made a huge mess that spilled out into the side yard, rats started burrowing underneath the planters and beds (I'm a container gardener, that side yard gets too messy for me to be 100% convinced its safe to grow in ground and if I have to move I want to be able to move my plants too. When I followed the burrows, it lead right to the SAME exact spot. The same window. And I found a dead rat done in by its handiwork at the end. It had triggered a landslide of dead dry sandy sediment onto it, buried itself and suffocated to death. In the middle of the pile of gravel, dust and sand was a mummified rat.
Also i once found a mouse the neighbors had trapped with a glueboard and I can confirm that it is incredibly distressing even though this is your nemesis being tortured here. I tried taking a loose brick and smashing its head and it didn't work because the ground was soft. It was really nightmarish. I just kept smashing and smashing and it would not die. Finally when it went i dropped it glueboard and all into the garbage can and then asked my neighbors to please not leave gluetraps with mice on them in the open. My cat doesn't go down there, but I can imagine someone's cat seeing the mouse and getting stuck on the glueboard and giving someone a huge hassle to groom. I'm not sure about rats, but my cat does a very good job of keeping mice out of my apartment. He's very very good at killing mice and het lets me know when some are skulking around by becoming obsessed with staring at a given area, and then running away when I see him there like he's afraid I'll steal his food. that said he hid his first ever mouse kill and I didn't find it for months. but I know it was him. he kept playing peekabo with me at night in that spot. like he didn't want me to see something. so that's a possibility too.
There's also expanding foam you can get, ten to fifteen dollars a can depending on sales and size. That stuff is good insulation anyway. And it is NOT good for animals to chew on that stuff. The dry foam will soak up moisture in their stomachs and just gum up the works in their digestive tract, not a good time.
Iâm sorry, I know itâs a bit morbid, but I enjoy hearing a mouse/rat trap *SNAP* and hear a brief squeal, knowing I just killed a pest in my yard.
For raised garden beds there are YT videos where people have made a cover out of PVC and some type of mesh to protect them from birds and other pests.
I had issues with a raccoon. One day she brought her adorable little baby, who got stuck on the neighbors power line. She eventually ripped down the line and severely injured the baby. Then proceeded to drag the baby back and the baby raccoon didnât want to go. It looked like a kid getting pulled under the bed by a monster.
Now I havenât seen the trash pandas for awhile and they have kept rats away.
Just thought Iâd share this story for entertainment purposes đ
Was the baby raccoon ok?
Wow would have been rich if you caught it on camera đ·
You should consider getting a trail cam! I just got one a few months ago for 15$ at Walmart (sport section hidden behind the counter) itâs so much fun and i bet you could get some cool footage for the channel. Iâm surprised more people donât do it.
Thank you for speaking out against inhumane glue traps.
Great tips. If one has lots of property locate compost away from everything and periodically dispatch. Or break down and dry up food scraps and spread like fertilizer. It actually helped my garden and no rats. It is hard when they start but doing all your tips really does work. Prayers to it all.
Had a pumpkin with a few bite matks in it, and have been cutting down trees so have lots of dead branches piled up, no mice or rats i don't think but there was a runaway quail living in there must have been surviving off the compost pile, gave me quite a surprise. Have been uploading some CZcams videos of whats going on here in Australia if anyone is interested, not quite epic as rough and out of focus. I am considering doing the apocalypse grow food challenge just to see if i can feed myself off the garden
Forget having a cat. Jack Russell is your best friend. It is no accident when you watch gardening programs all gardeners have a terrier. đ â€ïžđ
This is my first year (successfully) gardening and when I saw bugs and eggs on my tomatoes my first instinct was to burn it with fire because bugs are gross. Except Lady bugs. They are cute. Luckily lady bugs helped!
Now if I even see a rat in my garden I still want to burn it with fire! I'm getting rid of my carboard cemetery and will grow even more mints!
I hate rats and will pass out at the sight of one. Dead or alive they are nasty!
You are wonderful, a Godsend, this year I have made a hardware cage with firring strips 3' tall and 4'x8' but I have to take it out now, 1/2" grid.
growing sunflowers and bell peppers.
Last year they attacked in one dawn 2 rows in my front yard full grown 6-7'tall sunflowers, everyone who walked by stopped in amazement daily. Heartbroken, my 90day crop
They even obliterated the ba ck chokes, and few scattered seeds everywhere...had nothing left.
That's Florida. My leaking a/c and pipes like yours are definitely sources and where they are coming in.
Thank you.
I use aluminum foil to prevent them, I put it all around the bottom of my compost bin and it stopped the rats from getting into it.