Car and rat issue

[Buckman]

I appreciate that we live in a small village in the countryside and have to live with animals around us, but we have an issue with a rat or rats and our car. The car has a large flat engine cover and it is an ideal place for rats to nest. they collect earth, grass and seeds from bird feeders in the vicinity and leave it on top of the cover along with their faeces. I cleaned the engine top cover yesterday and this morning again a load of stuff on the engine cover. No issue with our other car as no place for them to nest as no engine cover. This has only been happening over the past couple of months.

I have sprayed the engine cover with disinfectant and more recently using Peppermint Oil rat repellent, but it does not seem to work so I am open to all suggestions as unfortunately neither of our cats have been able to catch Mr Rat.

 

[Damian]

Depending on how much room there is between the engine cover and the bonnet when closed, you could use a bait box with Rodenticide blocks inside.
Or there are other sachets of rat poison 1which has seed based contents and 1 which has pasta base contents. both of whichhave Rodenticide in them.

When placing any poison , leave undisturbed for at least a week as rats are very cautious animals and will view anything new withh suspicion.
Once you see activity at whichever system you use, keep a fresh supply going until no more activity is detected.
It will take several weeks in all probability.

 

[Jcloughie]

I have no suggestions, but things could be worse. (Sorry, you just reminded me of this).


John

 

[Buckman]

Thanks Damien. A few weeks ago we did kill a rat when starting the car and before we knew about the issue. It had chewed through the windscreen water pipe and must have drunk some of the water. When we returned home saw a rather large rat lying on the floor with rear end sliced open. At the time we never realised that they were nesting in the car and thought another vehicle had hit it.

 

[Buckman]

I have no suggestions, but things could be worse. (Sorry, you just reminded me of this).

View attachment 2914
John

That is not a problem to remove and would do it myself. Now a black mamba is a different story and you need a professional to shift it.
Reminds me of my ex-MIL who went to use the outside toilet (long drop) at bottom of the garden and while sitting on the loo spotted a black mamba in the rafters. She ran out screaming with her knickers around her ankles!

 

[Beachball]

I have no suggestions, but things could be worse. (Sorry, you just reminded me of this).

View attachment 2914
John

Looks like it keeping warm

 

[Beehpee]

How about leaving the engine cover off for a few days and see if they go looking elsewhere.

BP

 

[Buckman]

How about leaving the engine cover off for a few days and see if they go looking elsewhere.

BP

No idea how to remove the engine cover as cannot see screws. I have now parked the car across the road and removed the culprit bird feeder depriving the rats of seed that has fallen to the ground.
TBH I did think OH was putting too much seed in the open tray feeder, but I was not that brave to mention it. However I did mention that if the rats chewed through the wiring loom on the Jeep it would probably cost us over £1000 to replace the loom and no holiday. Never seen a feeder moved so quick!

 

[Jcloughie]

No idea how to remove the engine cover as cannot see screws. I have now parked the car across the road and removed the culprit bird feeder depriving the rats of seed that has fallen to the ground.
TBH I did think OH was putting too much seed in the open tray feeder, but I was not that brave to mention it. However I did mention that if the rats chewed through the wiring loom on the Jeep it would probably cost us over £1000 to replace the loom and no holiday. Never seen a feeder moved so quick!

The cover on mine just pulls off, held in place by spring clips. Don’t know if that is common.

John

 

[Ern]

It may not be a rat. There are several contenders. I had the same on our last car (Volvo) and got rid of it by removing the nest which was buried deep in gap at the back of the wing pressing.

 

[Buckman]

It may not be a rat. There are several contenders. I had the same on our last car (Volvo) and got rid of it by removing the nest which was buried deep in gap at the back of the wing pressing.

We killed one a couple fo weeks ago when we started the car so assume that others are doing the same.

 

[RogerL]

We killed one a couple fo weeks ago when we started the car so assume that others are doing the same.

Rats are all around - scientists calculate that no-one is ever more than 2 metres from a rat!

 

[Buckman]

Rats are all around - scientists calculate that no-one is ever more than 2 metres from a rat!

Seems they calculated incorrectly? I have never seen a rat running alongside our car. Given up believing most scientists.
According to them whatever we eat, drink, smell etc will kill us from cancer or some other nasty disease. LOL

 

[RogerL]

Seems they calculated incorrectly? I have never seen a rat running alongside our car. Given up believing most scientists.
According to them whatever we eat, drink, smell etc will kill us from cancer or some other nasty disease. LOL

Rats will be in the verge when you drive along - but I guess you'd be safe in lane 2 of a motorway!

 

[otherclive]

At this time of the year the young tend to move around more to search for their territor. We had a spate last year and saw them blatantly running around the garden and into and from neighbours gardens. It was exacerbated by two neighbours having major groundwork’s for extensions where old decking was ripped up. A concerted campaign between the three houses using baited traps and poison boxes soon resolved the issue. Well as far as the fact that they aren’t visibly seen any more in daylight and bird feeders are operational once again.

 

[Buckman]

The lady next door was running a hedgehog rescue. The council bin men refused to take away her garbage bags as there were so many and they were heavy with hedgehog stuff like bedding and stinking of urine etc. There would be up to 20 - 30 bags of garbage stacked up outside her home on the street side creating a health hazard.
Eventually planning visited as she never had permission to run a charity which is a business from her home. However that only happened about 2 weeks ago so probably accounts for the rat issue combined with the bird feeders.
Apparently the neighbour had over 100 hedgehogs inside her home and it is suspected that she may have had up to 300 at one time. Neighbours including ourselves were complaining about the stench especially in the summer months.

 

[RogerL]

At this time of the year the young tend to move around more to search for their territor. We had a spate last year and saw them blatantly running around the garden and into and from neighbours gardens. It was exacerbated by two neighbours having major groundwork’s for extensions where old decking was ripped up. A concerted campaign between the three houses using baited traps and poison boxes soon resolved the issue. Well as far as the fact that they aren’t visibly seen any more in daylight and bird feeders are operational once again.

We and our neighbours seem to get an influx of rats every few years - simply stopping feeding the birds for a couple of months gets rid of the rats for a couple more years - but the birds return as soon as food supplies resume.

 

[Buckman]

We and our neighbours seem to get an influx of rats every few years - simply stopping feeding the birds for a couple of months gets rid of the rats for a couple more years - but the birds return as soon as food supplies resume.

Our one feeder has 3 feeder tubes and no mess underneath. The fatballs are squirrel proof and have a small tray underneath so again nothing dropped on the floor.
However not sure if the rats are climbing up the feeder pole to access the hanging tubes which are the long ones. Lately over the past two weeks we have not had so many small birds visiting which is a bit unusual.

 

[Hutch]

Clearing out the garage (again) and found two nests of them, cleared those out, set two traps and caught three of the little beasts. Traps reset, nothing caught for the last week.

 

[Buckman]

Clearing out the garage (again) and found two nests of them, cleared those out, set two traps and caught three of the little beasts. Traps reset, nothing caught for the last week.

Stupidly we set traps probably in the wrong place and unfortunately caught a robin so never used them again.