Help!!
I bought some Rentokill Pasta Bait which has been down for over 2 weeks now, in normal bait boxes.   So far they've not TOUCHED IT.  Although it states to just put the bags out, we have now opened them.  Still no take!!   And they are around in similar numbers still.

Ideas please - and no, we are no longer feeding the birds AT ALL|.

MamaBas, take the bait out the boxes.  Rats are neophobic - scared of anything new.  The bait boxes are very intimidating for them.  We tried bait boxes originally and baited snap traps and cages and nothing we put in there got touched and we didn't catch a single rat.

Pasta bait, out of the boxes, worked within a few days.  Put the little blue sachets as near to their holes or down their holes as you can.  The best thing about the pasta bait is you can squish it into crevices in walls, you can chuck it down their holes, and it doesn't get everywhere or contaminate the environment.

You don't need to open the bags though, the rats will nibble through them.  If you put them ALL down the hole, you may not be able to monitor how much is getting eaten, but it can be a good way to get them addicted to it in the first place and then you can move to just outside their hole or in the opening...

Second, you need to remove other sources of food and rats do store up food.  So if you have previously fed birds, they may well have been storing food away in their dens and tunnels and have no need to touch your bait yet. 

Remove all food sources you can, and leave the pasta bait out, untouched by you, checking daily to see if they have started to take it yet.  It may take a week or two before they start to take it.  When they do start to take it, you are going to be putting out a lot of it daily - like 9 sachets a day - for many days, approx 5-7 days.  The rats need to ingest it for at least 3 meals before it affects them. 

We just had a second infestation in the garden this year - a year after the last one in the same place.  We just opened the third tub of pasta bait as ours have been taking all we've put out, every night.  This morning (day 5) was the first morning there was any left - just 2 sachets.  This is a sign they have started to die.

PS - Do not handle the blue sachets with your hands, as you will leave human scent on them.  Use latex gloves to touch the sachets and put them out.

Thanks OTTF.    I have to admit that as we've used them before elsewhere, we have used the boxes but mainly because I can't leave the bags anywhere my hounds might get to.   As it is the boxes are behind pieces of an old crate, sloped over the boxes to keep my guys off.   You may however, be right about not wanting to go in there, but I take that as meaning they are not yet hungry enough.   Not much to be done re the bags we've now opened (!!) although we do have a few left, unopened in the tub.

One good thing - we have only handled the bags.bait wearing gardening gloves so there should be no human smell there.

My husband filled up the latest holes - damp earth and then gravel with a paving stone over top.   So no chance of putting bags there either.

I think one thing we might try to attract them is put a bit of bird seed at the opening to the boxes/mixed with the poison........   I'm still wondering whether these seaside rats are more picky!!   We will be speaking to next door as I havew a feeling them are feeding the birds still which isn't helping make the rats hungry!!

Don't know where you live MammB, but have you checked your local council as my council treat mice and rats for free.

Even if they levy a charge, it may be cheaper in the long run to use them as they have stronger stuff than you can obtain yourself. Just a thought

> I think one thing we might try to attract them is put a bit of bird seed at the opening to the boxes/mixed with the poison........

I used to exhibit cavies and had a very large custom built shed for them.  I found rats were attracted to the grain I fed. And I couldn't get rid of it - my pigs needed it!

I mixed the poison with the grain that they had been stealing, but not before they had killed 3 pigs.  It took about 6 days before I saw the first dead rat.  I kept at it for another couple of weeks.  It worked.

Rats like tunnels. Get a piece or two of guttering or drain pipe and put the bait in that. Leave them near their own holes. Try some fresh bait and don't open the bags. You can peek in the pipes to see if it is taken

OMG Jean, that is awful - the rats actually killed your guinea pigs?!!!

MamaBas, I think you just somehow need to keep the dogs inside and take them outside on leads only for 5-7 days.  Then you can put the poison where you know the rats will take it.  I take mine out on lead to toilet when we have poison out and it's a pain in the ass because they won't toilet if they are all out with me on lead at the same time, so I have to take them one at a time...!! 

It is not very toxic poison for dogs - they would need to eat a tub or more of it in one go for it to affect them at the quantity/dosage it is.  (Which is why it's available over the counter/ by the general public - and why even rats need to eat 3 meals of it.)  But if you have dogs freely roaming outside for long periods, you probably want to keep them in and take them out on lead...

I don't think the bait stations will work - we tried that with our rats and they wouldn't go anywhere near, no matter what amazingly tasty stuff we mixed in - meat, smelly cheese, etc etc...

If they dig more holes, put the poison down them...

And with the gardening gloves, take care they don't smell of creosote or other strong gardening smells (fertiliser etc etc).

> have you checked your local council as my council treat mice and rats for free.

I did and they don't, sadly.   Up in Cambridgeshire they came out but Cornwall Council no longer do this.  But thanks for the thought.   I have a feeling what was used by the Cambridgeshire lot WAS stronger than is available OTC.

Yes, licensed pest controllers and councils have access to stronger poisons which the rats only need consume one dose of, to be effective.  Downside is that it is then much higher risk for dogs and other animals that may accidentally ingest it.

I'd also add:  Last year when we were going through Rat Hell and nothing seemed to be working, we had a Rentokill man out (I think it was Rentokill) and he was about as much use as a chocolate teaspoon.  He looked at the rat holes and said "I don't think you have much of a problem", then he PICKED UP WITH HIS BARE HANDS some RAT POOP and broke it (?!). 

I should add that I then watched everything he touched as he left our house, already knowing that I didn't want this guy dealing with the problem.  He touched the latch on the garden gate and I went back later and sprayed it with bleach and still to this day try to avoid touching it  

It was after that little episode that I discovered pasta bait and fixed the problem.  Which, I should add, was considerable because it took about 5-7 days for the rats to stop taking the bait - suggesting there were quite a lot!!!

> the rats actually killed your guinea pigs?!!!

I'm afraid so, and it totally put me off rats for life.  They started at the head, eating the brain.  It was so distressing, because you blame yourself.  It didn't matter that they had all mod cons - fans for the summer and warmth for the winter.  It was horrible though, and it made me feel sick to see.

That doesn't surprise me - they will take full grown chickens off perches so a guinea pig is no trouble!

OMG, I thought rats were scavengers, I didn't realise they would actually kill.

I feel positively much better about putting the poison out now

Currently on Day 7 with about 7-9 sachets a day being taken.  Gawd knows how many rats there are around, hate them!!!!

Oh yes, sadly a couple of years ago we heard a horrible noise at night in the garden and went out only to find a baby hedgehog had been killed by a rat, had top of it's head chewed.

The next night we heard the noise again, and the ex went out with torch and rescued another juvenile hedgehog and scared the rat off.

We sent piggy to a Sanctuary via the vet.

OMG!!  What sort of horrible noise???  Was it the hedgehog screaming in pain or the rats screaming or what?!

> or the rats screaming or what?!

Rats definitely do scream.  I heard one at night and looked out of the back door to see my Toy Poodle shaking the rat.  I told her that she was a good girl.

> had top of it's head chewed.

Barbara that was the worst thing.   It upset me terribly.

I assumed it was the Hedgehog, as they are quite vocal especially when mating I believe.

Well I'm still putting this pasta bait out and it's about 8 days later now, so I think we have a lot of rats... Last year I put it out for about 5-6 days and then they stopped taking it and I saw no sign of them again.

Have you considered traps? We had mouse issues a few years ago and i tried various poisons (also cried and threatened to get a cat - this was before we got the dogs) for weeks and eventually i got some nasty looking traps amand d a jar of nutella to bait them with. One week and 11 dead  mice later and it was all over.

tried traps all around the garden originally.  Baited them with all kinds of different things from smelly cheese to meat to peanut butter to chocolate - they didn't touch a single trap.  The wind would set them off though and it was such a pain to reset them.  Left them out for weeks before giving up.  Tried humane cage traps and also snap traps for rats.  Neither worked.  It would also be very difficult to kill all the rats with traps, when you have so many of them it's not really feasible...

Same story with the bait stations - they wouldn't take the bait or go near them.  Rats are much more neophobic than mice (and smarter), so they are not going to go near weird looking new things very readily.

I bought some glue boards which are not very ethical, but I really didn't want to use those and the pasta bait was the last thing I tried having tried all else and it worked a treat, and is working again this year. 

MamaBas sadly you may have to resort to glue boards if the pasta bait doesn't work for you but fingers crossed it does...

Still tearing my hair out re the rats who are clearly still around...... I may yet have to fork out £150 to a commercial company.

Pasta rat poison is a new one to me. I shall search for it. I had about 3 months of a rat problem over a year ago now. E Dorset Council seem to subsidise a commercial organisation who charged a very minimal amount and eventually managed to get rid of the rats. The lady who came was fantastic in advising how to keep dogs away & even helped me pen off an enclosure to keep them away from bait which was put inside other containers. (I never let the dogs in the garden unattended at that time.) She sprinkled Cadbury's chocolate powder on the bait and this worked well. Rats have been back again this month but fortunately my next door neighbours are willing to have the bait box in their garden so my dogs can't get to it. They call the rats "YOUR RATS"! and will not accept that the rats are most likely living under their sheds. My neighbour used to video them as she thought they were "cute"! Eventually they gave her a problem as well and she has now gone overboard, getting rid of all bird feeders, etc. I love to see the birds coming down to eat in my garden. It seems we have super rats, the same as super fleas, resistant to poisons used to kill them. Keep at it with the poison. As I say, it took 3 months for mine to go but they didn't recolonize for well over a year.

> I love to see the birds coming down to eat in my garden

Me too and it hurts to see them come in, look and fly off again.  Mind you at this time of year it's the Starlings that come in in droves so I really don't mind not having them (I know they have to eat but they leave SUCH a mess - pooh!!) and they drive off the sparrows and other small birds.  I hope I can get the feeders out again soon although I noticed they'd been digging into where our sewer runs across the garden over the last 2 days so they are still around despite no feeders up.   I think it must be nice and warm in under the paving stone across the hole (there's no manhole cover!).   We dealt with that yesterday morning.  Too dark yet to see whether they've gone in again.

Are you putting the pasta bait outside of the bait boxes now MamaBas?  Are they eating it but you don't see it working or are they just not eating it?

Our rats are still taking ours, now at day 10-ish.  We are on tub 4 and I've another 3 tubs on order.  I am only putting out 3 sachets a day at the moment because I'm trying to get this tub to last until we get more in!!! 

Bloody hate them, I feel like the whole yard is 'unclean' and I hate being out there, which isn't how I want to feel about my own garden... I blame it on the guy next door, who keeps horses and has a stable and also chickens roaming about.

@ 1234 - no, I've left both boxes ALONE for now - after opening the bags I felt it best to leave alone (our smell) and hope they'll take it, eventually.  I have, in the meantime, bought a plastic baffle for the pile the feeders are on, said to be a squirrel deterrant which should work for rats.  The RSPB gave me a lot info. about how best to deal with this situation (other than bait the rats) including buying sunflower hearts which should stop the birds sifting through the variety feed I was using.   I was almost out of that in any case.  So we'll see.

And yes, of course where there are chickens, never mind horses/stables/feed, there will be rats.   Which is why so many have Jackies!!!   I'm sure we've always had rats around, but not at such close quarters.

Meanwhile, until we get the sunflowed seed in place/baffle, the birds will have to find their feed elsewhere sadly.

Ok, I'm just saying that our bait boxes were out there for months with bait in, and the rats wouldn't go near.  The first night we removed the bait boxes and just put the bait out alone, it was all taken the next morning....

> The first night we removed the bait boxes and just put the bait out alone, it was all taken the next morning....

Fair enough BUT I cannot leave bait out, other than in the boxes because of my hounds.   We had a chat with next door yesterday and hopefully they will be baiting too and not feeding the birds, for now.

MamaBas, could you not keep the dogs indoors just overnight and put the bait out and remove any left in the morning??  The rats actually take the bait out of the bait boxes, so you're not really protecting your dogs by putting it in there - they can drop it and leave it around, they take it to their nests.  (It's not often they leave much, but it is possible.) 

And your dogs would need to eat about 3 tubs of this stuff in one go for it to kill them - it is 0.0005% diclofenum (if I spelt that right), so it is not very strong at all for dogs... I don't think you will have much success leaving it in bait boxes.

You could try putting some peanut butter on it. When I had my cage trap set up it worked much better when I smeared that on whatever I had on the hook. I use it on mouse traps too.
I'd put some on the outside of the box as well to encourage them to go near it.

Update.   I haven't SEEN any rats for a few days now (and it's been so grizzly muddy out there, having checked the boxes) but we've bought and installed the baffle on the pole and have been able to get all the feeders back out again.   Plus the sunflower seed although I have to say the birds haven't been keen on that, so far.   But my colony has scattered since we removed all feeders so we are really only so far, seeing a few starlings, and a couple of bluetits (after the peanuts).

Update 2.   One small dead rat this am.

Hum.   When is a dead rat NOT a dead rat?  When my husband took our hounds out first thing, our Whippet 'pointed' a dead small rat out there just under the bedroom window.  She didn't touch it.   Leaving it to pick up once it got light(er) out there, when we went back to sort it out, it was gone.    And believe me, this rat was DEAD.   There was another bigger rat further out on the grass however - much bigger than the one seen earlier.   Would a rat come in and remove their own?

Yes.  Birds of prey do as well.  Owls. 

Have you checked the poison supplies, are they taking it yet? 

We have just finished tub 4 of pasta bait.... had to go slow last week as we were running low, but now have loads, so full steam ahead...

> Birds of prey do as well.  Owls.

Well it was right under the bedroom window and although we have sparrow hawks swooping in, I don't think it, or an owl, would have noticed it right against the bungalow here - and it was pouring with rain between when mine first went out and it getting light enough to get out to remove that rat - and by then it had stopped raining as hard.   Strange that.   And no, it's been so filthy out there, we've not checked the boxes yet.

Hi, I live in central London and have been trying to get rid of some rats in my garden.  To my horror they seemed to have moved into my house.  I am hoping to find someone with a terrier who could come and help me - I already have pest control who are coming in tomorrow but I
can't sleep hearing the rats in my walls and ceiling..  Does anyone have any suggestions

Are you sure it's rats, it's amazing how noisy mice can be rattling around. Sometimes it sounds like they have hobnailed boots on

I am surprised no one has mentioned a cat!
My puss is the most anti social cat I have ever owned but she is a voracious rat killer!

She does sometimes bring them home still alive but will eventually finish the job.

> I am surprised no one has mentioned a cat!

Or a Toy Poodle.  Mine was a good rat killer.

The problem with cats and dogs, is that they need to have access to the rats.  I never saw a single rat, myself - yet their poop was everywhere.  They are far too flighty to be caught in enough numbers by a cat or dog.  And they breed too fast.

I recommend pasta bait, still.  Our rats have now stopped taking it after stuffing their faces on it.  I am leaving it out there many nights more, to be sure.  Then pasta bait has saved the day for us again, as last year.

Ha I have a toy poodle who is not interested in them but my miniature poodle once killed one by using his muzzle as a hammer!

Update -

We checked the bait boxes this morning.  ALL the bait had been taken.  So we refilled one with what we had left, and I've just ordered more.

That's excellent MamaBas - just a warning that you may need a lot of it(!).  They suggest you check bait boxes daily and replace, so I think you need more of a routine going or you may not make much of a dint on the rat population... glad they are now eating it though...

My cat catches them and brings them inside still alive!! She has no idea how to kill them. It doesn't help that i have a severe phobia with rodents, i hate them with a passion, I look away when they are on TV, I've also enlisted the help of neighbours to get rid of them when my husband hasn't been home to do the job.
We now have a little Jack Russell. So i'm hoping his instincts are intact. I'm thinking my cat will catch them and He will dispatch them!