Topic: Rats again

[Hyacinth]

(don't want my question to get lost in the 'dilemma' debate...)

Q = do rats nests, lairs, dens, whatever they're called, smell? There's a so-far unidentified horrible pong somewhere deep in the undergrowth - it's not the smell of foxes, it's not the smell of dead birds/animals....just this horrible smell. There are rats around. Before I go to investigate further, might it be rats?

[daileg]

the answer to this would be yes they have a definate smell of old musky type smell like a dirty cellar smell

[Hyacinth]

.....but not an old wine-cellar smell...would have been acceptable....hmmm.

Thank you daileg.  You've confirmed my suspicions. Shall investigate when kitted out in cover-alls, gauntlets and wellies....reading the other rats thread think there may be  a likelihood of...pups?...too. btw....what's the name for a rats 'nest' please? Action I propose after clearing the area, should I disturb any of the little folk, when presumably they'll scatter elsewhere in my garden or into a neighbour's, will be to phone the Rat Man to lay poison or whatever..

The little fieldmice I occasionally have as visitors, I don't mind at all - in fact one, one year, over-wintered and nested in a wellie boot in my potting shed LOL...but there's something I really don't like about rats, although I presume(?) mice might also carry disease? Dunno...

[OllieC]

Hi Lish, their main smell is ammonia - they tend to live in fusty places, so it's not always easy to tell. But when I was a kid, we had a load living in an old van containing grain (don't ask!), and it smelt of mouldy wee... until we killed them, when it just smelt of rotten meat & mouldy wee (from the decomposing carcases, I guess).

[silly billy]

Field mice will eat rat poison  :-[ :-[

[Robert_Brenchley]

You might smell rats in an enclosed space, but not in the open. Not live ones anyway. I had a revolting smell round my shed a few weeks ago, and as the Dracunculus weren't in bloom, it had to be a rotting corpse. Sure enough, I eventually found the remains of a rat, which went in the stream. An hour later, a thunder shower flushed it away.

[N8R]

hello Alishka_Maxwell  with all my knew found knowledge of rats thanks to the "'dilemma' debate..." ha ha ha my answer would be   no as i have located what i believe to be the nest and apart from the obvious wet musky smell all rats even domestic ones have there is nothing like you are describing sounds like a dead body to me !!

[OllieC]

Field mice will eat rat poison  :-[ :-[

..and they poo in your PSB whilst eating it... plus they spread disease too (despite their cuteness)!

It's a harsh world out there, with few simple answers.

[calendula]

have you got drains or open sewers in your garden - they are more common then people think and with all the recent rains something might have risen or got stuck

[Hyacinth]

Thanks all...with the recent rains and then playing catch-up with my work, I've not been up my garden for a while. I'll go and have a sniff tomorrow..no, calendula, no drains etc. in that part. I'll report back..