Rat Problem

[71silverbullet]

Ok don't know where to post this so this sounds like as good a place as any.
I have a large rat living in my garage, and he is very smart. I've tried a variety of traps and bait with no luck. I've used rat traps with cheese, peanut butter, bologna, and raw meat. He didn't touch any of it. I've put glue traps out and he goes around them. The wife bought some electric trap it didn't work either. All of these were placed where he travels to his nest.
Last weekend I put on my night vision goggles and sat with a 22 pistol loaded with bird shot, sat quietly in the dark for about an hour, turns out he has night vision too! He poked his head out from under the safe, I saw him, moved slightly and he ducked back and didn't come back out.
Poison is not an option because the garage is also the dogs house.
I have no idea how he did this but tonight I pulled the safe out and there was TWO FULL snow shovel scoops full of cat litter under there! Probably 15 pounds of cat litter!
This has been going on for a couple of months. I've removed 3 different nests in three different places.
I know most of you will probably disagree, but I really believe there is only one in there. I've only seen him one time running, and the one time with the nv goggles.
I'm determined not to let this rat win, I plan on setting up some kind of blind and trying the nv and bird shot again this weekend.
Any suggestions?

 

[snapping turtle]

A rat terrier and a shovel. I am surprised that your dog has no taken it out.

 

[rgrimm01]

Have you considered turning a 10' black snake loose(readily available in the countryside in about a month I would think.)? How about blaring rock-n-roll music(worked to smoke out Noriega)? If you did play the radio 24/7 for a while, it might mask any sound you make while trying to snipe him. If it is in the wall, I would go in after it. Put a webcam or wildlife cam in the garage to note comings and goings. Might give you behavioral insight. If you do not have a wildlife cam, good selling point to have to have one...

 

[71silverbullet]

A rat terrier and a shovel. I am surprised that your dog has no taken it out.

The dog can't get to it. The rat stays along the walls, and with all the shelves, tool boxes, bicycles etc the dog can't get to the wall, but he does try.
I would welcome a couple of snakes, and in a month or so one will probably find its way in there, its happened before.

 

[snapping turtle]

Call Bily the exterminator. My youngest loves that show......

 

[71silverbullet]

Call Bily the exterminator. My youngest loves that show......

There you go! Or Turtle Man

 

[jve153]

i just got the whole cartoon image of a gentleman with NV goggles strapped to his face with a very james bondish suppressed pistol sneaking around and speed gonzalez type rat waving and running away. thank you for making my morning

 

[rby1rby]

If its attracted to cat litter
Try taking all cat litter out of the garage & then put cat litter in the trap.
Worth a try maybe

 

[Tydeeh22]

more sabotage. find the nest. dont move it. set a snare on the incoming route and wait for a corpse.

 

[rotortech]

There is not one rat. There are many. They have underground burrows outside your residence and they have at least one burrow in your walls. They are finding food in your garage - probably dog food. You need to use poison. You will have to use a bait station. It is a plastic box that other animals can not get into but the rat loves to check them out. The poison is on the inside. If you can't do this on your own you really should call an exterminator. Hunting them down one at a time won't get rid of them. They are very persistent.

If they are not in your kitchen yet, they soon will be.

 

[71silverbullet]

There is not one rat. There are many. They have underground burrows outside your residence and they have at least one burrow in your walls. They are finding food in your garage - probably dog food. You need to use poison. You will have to use a bait station. It is a plastic box that other animals can not get into but the rat loves to check them out. The poison is on the inside. If you can't do this on your own you really should call an exterminator. Hunting them down one at a time won't get rid of them. They are very persistent.

If they are not in your kitchen yet, they soon will be.

I'm just not really convinced that there are many, I'm just not seeing signs of am infestation. The walls are metal. Yes they are eating the dog food. I have thought about the bait stations, my wife fears the dog may chew on the dead rat and ingest the poison?
As far a being inside the house, a long a I've lived there I've never even seen one single mouse dropping, and hope I don't ever.
I will look for burrows around the outside of the garage. If I find any I'm gonna fill em gasoline and yippi ki yay mf!

 

[sbcman]

I'm just not really convinced that there are many, I'm just not seeing signs of am infestation. The walls are metal. Yes they are eating the dog food. I have thought about the bait stations, my wife fears the dog may chew on the dead rat and ingest the poison?
As far a being inside the house, a long a I've lived there I've never even seen one single mouse dropping, and hope I don't ever.
I will look for burrows around the outside of the garage. If I find any I'm gonna fill em gasoline and yippi ki yay mf!

We had fears of our dog eating mice that had been in the poison traps as well, but were told by both pest control and vet that the amount of poison required to kill the mice was far below anything that would hurt our dog.

And they must be right, he's ate a ton of them.

Of course, these are mice, not rats, and that might make a difference.

 

[71silverbullet]

Thanks sbcman thats what I was looking for. I will try the bait stations
After of course one more attempt at shooting it, that's just way more fun.

 

[wild willy]

I just want to hear what ends up working...I have Moles and shrews that frequent my garage.......I killed quite a few with traps.......Not for a long time...they have gotten smarter............

 

[1$Chuck]

I'm just not really convinced that there are many, I'm just not seeing signs of am infestation. The walls are metal. Yes they are eating the dog food. I have thought about the bait stations, my wife fears the dog may chew on the dead rat and ingest the poison?
As far a being inside the house, a long a I've lived there I've never even seen one single mouse dropping, and hope I don't ever.
I will look for burrows around the outside of the garage. If I find any I'm gonna fill em gasoline and yippi ki yay mf!

What kind of metal walls do you have in that garage? I'd be money he's got some way in and out of there. If you 100% positive that he doesn't then I'd keep the poochies away from there for a few days, get rid of anything liquid in that garage and leave out a little bit of antifreeze for him to quench his thirst.

 

[71silverbullet]

Its a pole barn, corrugated metal. In the above reference to the burrows in the walls I took it to mean "living in the walls" like a framed house walls. Yes he/they are coming in and out along the bottom.

 

[1$Chuck]

Its a pole barn, corrugated metal. In the above reference to the burrows in the walls I took it to mean "living in the walls" like a framed house walls. Yes he/they are coming in and out along the bottom.

That makes more sense now. Do you not have the J trim at the bottom of the metal to seal off the openings that the ribs make? Might be something to look into.

 

[vesan87]

Find a neighborhood cat and throw him in the garage for a while.

 

[cwillour]

two words: rat hockey

Seriously, our dog is only about 45lbs, but we stopped poisoning after she starting foaming w/in minutes of getting to one of the rodents. I think it has to do w/ whether the rat has time to absorb the poison or if it there is additional poison on the body from walking through it and in the stomach from a last meal (at least that's what I understood from the vet.)

$700+ over the next 2-3 days and she still gets seizures from periodically (she is on daily meds for the seizures, but they still happen when she gets too nervous) and it just is not worth a repeat.

At the farm, we have good luck w/ a baiting a soda can on a dowel sitting on a 5-gal bucket half-filled w/ water (they drown in the water, so the bait can be non-toxic.) I have used my kid's old sandbox in the yard as a larger variant of this for squirrels w/ some success, so I think it would work for rats.

 

[71silverbullet]

Well great, now the poison is out again. I tried the bucket thing, baited it with dog food no luck