Rats!

We’ve just discovered, in the last couple of days, that some rats (Rats! Rats! F-ing rats with…aw, forget it) have moved into our attic, and maybe even down some walls.
So I’m wondering, has anyone ever used those sonic repeller as seen on TV thingies? If so, have they worked?
I’d so very much like it if the rats would leave.

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151 thoughts on “Rats!”

  1. My husband and I were in the living room watching X-Files one time, and the episode was about an exterminator that could see thru walls. So we’re all into the show when those two mice walk right in front of the TV, taking their good ole time… Damn the special effects on that show!

  2. Whatever you do, don’t get a cat, unless it’s mice you’re talking about and not rats.
    I’ve personally seen rats fighting cats, and more often that nor, the rat wins.
    Or it might just be that the rats in our neighborhood is as big as a small dog…

  3. Following my earlier comment, I recall a scene in the first episode of “Tour of Duty” (a superb dramatic series in the late 80s, sort of an updated “Combat!”), where one character freaked out about a rat in their barracks, and they all opened up with their weapons. They all missed.

  4. You can’t do any better than live special effects, haha. Chris Carter must have earned his money on that one, haha.

  5. btw, if anyone in your house has asthma (as I do), you might want to give the spaces occupied by the rats a thorough cleaning after getting rid of them. It can be pretty nasty for your family’s health, and not obvious at first.

  8. Wil,
    Hire Indiana Jones and have him roam around your house.
    If he says, “Oh rats!” You’ve found’em!

  10. *Thank you*, Wil…it was going to kill me. Slowly and painfully. I *thought* it was a joke, but could not freakin’ remember. Although my first response was “R.O.U.S’s!” (10 points for this one kiddies).
    I realize that the joke blatantly belongs to you (by virtue of the “most recent user” clause in the joke tellers manual)…but you don’t mind if I use it? I need something to add some spice to my “Mommy! Mommy!” and “Dead Baby” joke cache.
    Btw…rats make great pets. My white-whister (sp?) lab rat-saved from the PITT Psych Labs was the *coolest* dorm pet ever. And my buddy owns a Hooded rat who is just the sweetest so and so in the rat kingdom. Don’t know about the attic/wall dwelling kind. Get a cat…then sit back and watch it watch the walls and schitz-out when it hears the rats moving around. That’s entertainment folks.
    Rent “The Secret of Nimh”…but don’t rent “Rats”

  11. get a fire gun and just chase the little suckers out! you’d get to dress up like arnold in terminator or commando and rampage your house while hunting them!

  13. Wil,
    I had trouble with rats (Norway rats they’re called, actually) once in the past, and got some of that poison that amy was talking about from the feed / fertilizer store. The one where once the rat’s consumed the poison, it’s supposed to drive them out in search of water. (Cotton-mouth, I suppose…)
    Anyway…the poison worked, but not in that manner. Got rid of the rats, but fortunately no deaths in the walls, so I didn’t have to tear into them to get the dead bodies out. Enough “death talk”… 😮 )
    Those sonic repellers are worthless…don’t waste your time OR your money.
    Good luck in the “hunt”…
    A Texas “boi”,
    Mark

  14. 10 points for a Princess Bride quote? Geez, your points must be worth about the same as the lire….

  15. You know, looking back up there I feel really dumb for wasting my time finding a link to that joke since Wil had already posted it… but it hadn’t loaded on my page. *sigh*
    Okay, maybe not THAT dumb.

  16. I’m gonna echo the same as all the others…. we we had mouse in our house in college (I almost had a heart attack getting out of the shower before work one day and a damn mouse ran across the floor like 2 feet from me) we tried a bunch of stuff. we wanted to be humane but the sonic things never worked and the humane traps were a pain cause they would eventually trap them, but they would come back (like a homing pigeon) after about ten weeks of this we gave up and hired a professional. it was sad, but we didn’t feel like we had a choice.
    amellia

  17. -ok if you go the way of the poison get a professional- no not them! “as Andie drags Wil away from the hookers”
    -However if you go the way of the glue traps there’s nothing funnier then watching those damn rats get stuck-
    – if you get the cat- Make sure He’s a Fat Horny Cat so he will either kill them by either sitting on them or fucking the hell out of them-
    -Warning watchout that you don’t put the glue traps where the cat my stick his head in them- aww hell let’m it might be fun to watch th cat run around the house with the damn box glued to his head- it was loads of fun at my old house when my cat got stuck w/her back foot in one– clunk, clunk, clunk, as she walked by us as if to say – “Don’t fucking say a word!” —
    — it was the smaller ones used to catch bugs- but they make bug ones for rats

  19. Ooooooooh….
    Rob.. that was…
    Hold on having a William Shatner pose momment.
    Ah better.
    You rock not only me, my world but my universe and prolly even Uranus.
    Ah it was a decent try. Shit. Brain numb after my Sunday Morning 1 am breakfast/soap opera.
    Ah the Waffle House.
    Sandy the waitress vs Frank the Cook
    Every Sunday Early Morning- same battle of egos fighting it out. Dishes are thrown, words are spent..
    Gods it’s lovely to watch.. It’s no Tribe but I taped that earlier tonight.
    Thank the gods for greasy spoon places and New Zealand Soap dramas.
    -Kitty
    Power and Chaos!

  20. I am just no help on this subject. But I like seeing my name in the comments section.
    The closest experience I have to this was when we had raccoons in our chimney. Animal Control ended up setting a trap on our roof to catch them as they left at night to go forage. Well, Mom Raccoon got caught all right. Trapped in the cage for the night.
    Unfortunately for her, late that night we had a HUGE thunderstorm blow in.
    Now I don’t want those critters in my house, but I kinda felt bad for it getting whipped by the winds and drenched in the deluge. Especially since the cage was located over our room so I could hear it all night.
    But it was funny the next morning seeing a waterlogged raccoon on our roof. I’m sure if it could have, it would have given me the finger when it saw me come out the next morning.

  21. – Wayy off the subject–
    – I just read the article in people Mag and saw your family. Ya’ll look so great! Just wanted to incourage those who hadn’t read it yet, to get it and do so before their all gone- people weekly feb11, 2002 page 101- my hubby got home late and i instructed him to pleasesss get me a copy on the way home-

  23. Suddenly I’m reminded of the ST:TNG episode where Wesley inadvertantly creates a race of sentient nanites.
    mmmmm Unitards… *droool*

  24. C’mon you guys…haven’t any of you seen Mouse Trap????!?!?! Wil, it’s clear you just need to move.
    😉
    Kati

  25. Wil,
    How the f*** do you get rats in your wall ? That’s just sick!
    Umm, don’t have any advice really, ‘cos I live in an apartment complex.
    Have you tried shotguns ? That’ll surely shit ’em up and force them to leave.

  26. It’s easy really.
    Step 1: Kill Kenny
    Step 2: Wait for rats to come and take him away.
    Step 3: Trap rats for release back into the wild. Or Rush Limbaugh’s backyard. Your choice.
    Seriously though, no little creature deserves to die just because in its search for food or warmth or whatever it stumbled into someone-or-other’s house. I’m wrestling with this because I have a big problem with ants right now. Like, ants in my BED. They’re coming through a gap in a window frame and use my bed as a quick way to get to the water in the bathroom. This morning I got bitten a few times and without thinking jumped out of bed half-asleep and poured a huge puddle of ant bait on the window sill. It stopped them sure, but later on I was walking past and noticed the ones that were still alive prodding the dead ones and eventually picking them up and carrying them back to the nest. After watching them for a while I actually got all teary eyed and felt really awful, particularly because it was the kind of bait that wipes out the nest too. I really messed up, and I feel really bad about it.
    Wil, use the sonic thing, whether it works well or not you’ll feel better for it.

  27. Rats in the walls huh? One of the penalties in living in a house that has cavity walls. My advice? Go get some advice from an expert in pest control. Those will be the only guys who know what they’re doing; if you follow everyone else’s advice you’ll either burn the house down, poison your family (from the smart bombs and rat poison) or blow the place up. And knowing rats they’ll be the ones that survive!

  28. we had one of those sona things to help get rid of the cats in our backgarden. Itt worked to begin with but after a while the cats ignored it, and oine cat even dug it up and ran off with it, so my advice to you is either get a professional in to catch them and take them out to the wild or get a cat, either will do a good job I be thinking.
    Be humane about the rats though, they maybe annoying but they are still living creatures and deserve to live, although not in your house if you can help it!!
    Hope you sort out the problem soon.
    Good luck
    Beastly_spike

  29. How about carpet bombing them with thermite plasma or an all out nuclear assault? *Goofy grin from previous thread*

  30. Wil.
    You can get a rather deep bucket and put water in it. add some sugar or peanut butter and the rats will be drawn to it, fall in the bucket and you can collect them and get rid of them.
    If you insist that killing them is the way to go, then add more water to the bucket so they drown.
    Or, get a cat. They work.

  31. Try to find a have a heart trap, or a couple of them. Then you can trap all the rats and set them free in a big field and give them little lunch bags to take on their journey.

  32. Careful about letting your dog take care of the rats for you–a friend of a friend borrowed his sister’s terrier to get rid of rats in the barn. The terrier got all the rats (will spare you the messy details), pure instinct kicking in just fine, but after that, the dog decided that hunting rats was fun, and if he couldn’t find rats, he would hunt other things. To make a long story short, the sister could no longer keep the terrier as a pet, so her brother bought the dog, and several others, and started offering terrier-ratcatching services.

  33. mister fred fowler advised “Go with a cat. Or Christopher Walken”
    apparently, bridget fonda, whilst working on a set with walken, approached him while he was eating a slice of canteloupe. he took a bite and murmured ‘tastes like mouse.’
    fred could be onto something here.

  36. Wil,
    Don’t mess around with these things. These are dangerous animals which could be carrying rabies or several varieties of parasites, which you don’t want the kids (or yourself) to get. It’s not worth it to try to save a buck where your family’s health is concerned.
    Call a professional (now). They will not only get rid of the rats, they can help you figure out where the rats got in so you can seal up the holes. It’s not super expensive and you shouldn’t need to move out either, that’s nonsense.

  37. Humane way of having a home with no rats?
    Yeah, move.
    OT —spoilers—-
    Have you ever had a party where people left oragami cranes behind?
    Would that be considered a _good_ party?
    O

  38. to hot soup girl,
    that web site was sick absolutly sick,
    how can you look at that and still keep your dinner in,
    you are one deranged child.
    Beastly Spike

  39. you’re right, beastly_spike, i should probably have posted that link with a warning. my apologies. i’ve been surfing the net so long i think i may have become inured to the atrocities of war.
    for the record, i’m not recommending this particular method of rat-eradication. just being topical.

  40. Would you still try to kill the rats, if it meant that a few harmless squirls and chipmunks might get killed as well?

  41. AHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAH
    that website was funny, hot soup girl.
    collateral mouse damage….
    Geez, animals are kewl and all and every species has a right to exist, but we’re a predatory species. Prey species take a risk when they invade the territory of a predator.
    US OR THEM, BAYBEE
    “Este carne esta rata” (i think that’s how it’s all spelled)
    Seriously though, where are you gonna dump these things if you can catch them alive? They either become part of the food chain or they go and invade some other poor unexpecting person’s house.
    Just be HUMANe as possible as you slag the little rat bastards… oh, they ARE rat bastards… you ever see a rat wedding ceremony?
    *taking another bite of his ratburger and washing it down with some beer*

  42. HSG- That was fantastic! What a hoot.
    Hmm.. owl. Owl’s like rodents.
    I didn’t think it was too gross.
    Mice who trespass become dead.
    Simple fact.
    As in my house it’s spiders.
    I’ve sat down with their leader.
    We decided that they can keep the unfinished part of the basement as long as they don’t trespass in the following areas. My room, and my shower.
    The rest of the house is still off limits but not guarded as highly as my two areas.They get in my way. Bam. No more spider.
    I’ve tried to concede my sister’s room but the arial assault of pop music kills them.
    So the war goes on.
    Damn them for trying to contract in outside help.
    That wolf spider was a mess to clean up after the 30 lbs metal filing cabniet put an end to him.
    I’m hoping their alliance with the thousand leggers doesn’t go through. I really hate those bastards.
    That site was too funny… hehee.

  44. I’d recommend against driving the rats away with sonic thingies. You’ll effectively be dumping the rat problem on somebody else in your neighborhood.
    After all, the rats ain’t gonna pack up and move into some forest and live there. They’ll just scatter into the nearby houses and breed there.
    Paying a professional to get rid of the rats and to rat-proof your house would be the way to go in my opinion.

  46. Hey Wil,
    Since you’re a “celebrity” you could go and hire one of those “Animal psychics to the Stars”, you know, one of those spooky chicks who can talk to animals? She could then just psychicly ASK the rats to leave! I think I saw one on Animal Planet the other week.
    Other than that, I have no other ideas that people haven’t suggested already. One time, when I was living with my Grandmother in Loma Linda, we found that she had rats living in her attic crawl space and walls, also. The rats would gnaw on the attic rafters in the night and it got to be really annoying more than anything. We put rat poison in the attic and the rats died. The nasty thing was that one of the rats died in the wall space. It stank up the house for about a week before the little creatures that eat dead things finally did their job and the rat carcass was no more. ICK!
    Let us know how the rat sitch’ turns out!
    xox

  48. My school has rats.
    Of course, we also hadvemold. We’re getting rid of both by closing the school for (hopefully it will only be) a year and a half and cleaning up…and forcing us to go to school in a fleet of mobiles that we “fondly” call the Trailer Park.
    But somehow I don’t think you’re willing to do that…but hey, it was worth typing…
    Or maybe not…

  49. we have mice in my house too. the mouse traps (we tried like 50 kinds), they catch the mice, but they keep on coming. we then got the sonic repeller, and its great. havent had a problem since.

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