rats in the garden

[obsessed]

I found a dead rat in my garden. Gross. It was laying on top of a newly amended bed. The bed was amended with compost some fertilizer and a layer of grass. What could have killed it? And now what do I do with it?

I don't think it was a cat cause it was huge. And my dog is so not fast enough to catch a rat. And he is more civilized that he would never do that.

 

[digitS']

I had to keep my eyes closed but I found the info in Wikipedia that says a "common" brown rat weighs on average, 12 ounces.

I could squint a little and learned that a "bushy-tailed pack rat" weighs up to 1.3 pounds. That would be, 21 ounces.

My little female cat once nailed a pack rat while I was standing about 10 feet away! Actually, I wasn't standing . . . more like dancing . . . "don't let it get me! don't let it get me!"

Luckily, I had a brave-hearted kitty to take care of the evil thing for me .

Garbage can, O. Garbage can.

Steve

 

[hoodat]

I found a dead rat in my garden. Gross. It was laying on top of a newly amended bed. The bed was amended with compost some fertilizer and a layer of grass. What could have killed it? And now what do I do with it?

I don't think it was a cat cause it was huge. And my dog is so not fast enough to catch a rat. And he is more civilized that he would never do that.

How big is huge? I see you have a lot of water around you. Could it have beeen a nutria? They look like a huge rat but with soft fur like a muskrat.

 

[obsessed]

ok garbage can. I got it. And it was huge. It already has maggots so I don't know how big it would be....but I don't know if it was nutria size. I have only see them in water no above. But we do have them around.

 

[vfem]

Oh my goodness! AGH! I saw a rat cross the street out on this country road, and yes, it was HUGE. I panicked just looking at it.

In the trash can it goes.

A cat or dog probably hit it, chased it, ect, ect and it rain off terrified and beat up and then probably just laid down and died in your garden. I see it happen around here. The cats play with the voles and moles until almost dead, they get enough energy to escape elsewhere (namely my garden) and then just die!

 

[Ladyhawke1]

Surprise! Guess what? Ya all got rats and just dont know it. :/

I have a feed store that I go to in a very exclusive area of my town. On this one visit to the feed store, I felt I needed some expert advice. I embarrassingly confessed to the owner what I had seen the night before. RATS! There in the moon light, it was a full moon.I had looked out the window and .. Holy cow batman! It looked like a Star Wars Convention‼!

The feed storeowner told me that that was not unusual. He said that he had quite few customers in the area that had set up motion cameras and they were blown away at scope of the activity that they saw.

He said that his customers are seeing a lot of damage to their trees. I personally, vouch for the bark being eaten off my Bougainvillea trees. I can tell you thisthat animals sense things far before we do. They have had a very good summer and I think now they are preparing for a HARD winter. :bee

 

[hoodat]

Around Southern California we have quite a few tree rats living in dead palm fronds. People hear about them and have the tree service come out and trim all the dead fronds off their palms but we also have several rare species of bats that use those fronds.

 

[obsessed]

Totally could have been a nutriea but I am going to go with rat. I guess I should be thankfull for my kitty kats.

 

[ducks4you]

Rat stuff
http://web.extension.illinois.edu/wildlife/directory_show.cfm?species=mice
http://www.idph.state.il.us/envhealth/pcnorwayrat.htm
^ ^ ^ ^ ^ ^ ^ ^ ^ ^
THIS is an introduced species.
Marsh Rice Rat (THIS is a native species.)~
http://www.mnh.si.edu/mna/image_info.cfm?species_id=238
You can take the duck out of the research class, but you CAN'T take the researcher out of the duck.

 

[Rhodie Ranch]

Where I last lived in San Jose, we had roof rats. They lived in the trees and the attics of homes. My cat would get one once in a while. They were no big deal, except when they ate my zucchini. What I hated more, where the thousands of squirrels there. I used to poison them, until we got a dog as did the neighbors. Then the squirrels taunted the dogs ALL DAY LONG!!!!