Sunday, April 5, 2009

I smell a rat

Actually, I don't smell one. I hear one.

There are rats in our basement again. And they come up in the walls and get into the space beneath our kitchen cabinets - the space called the toe-kick.

They're bold as brass, too. Tonight, while I write, one of them is under there, chewing on something, crunching away. I can hear him. I walk over to the kitchen cabinets, quietly, and listen to the one he's under. Then I slam the cabinet door, loudly.

The crunching stops. But only for a few seconds or so. Then it starts up. You can almost sense the rat going - "Yeah? So what. Try and stop me."

We powered up the RatZapper again this evening. We no longer have a dog, so instead of dry dogfood, we used a handful of Corn Chex for bait. We positioned it along a wall - they tell you to do that, because rats like to run alongside walls.

Rat infestations are an inevitable part of living in a rural area. We get them at certain times of year. We zap maybe a dozen rats each summer.

Chew on this, you little hairy bastard!
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10 comments:

  1. mo.stoneskinApril 5, 2009 at 2:55 AM

    Crumbs I couldn't cope with rats. I think ours tend to stay underground.

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  2. Gary's third pottery blogApril 5, 2009 at 3:18 AM

    bleh! We have cute little red squirrels that seem so sweet outside, but like to try to get into the house in the winter.....

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  3. Woman in a WindowApril 5, 2009 at 6:10 AM

    rrrraatttsss?
    Mice, ok.
    rats?
    Not ok.
    git 'em!

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  4. BrigetApril 5, 2009 at 7:36 AM

    Ugh. Rats. So far we've never gotten a rat (I watch for chimpmunks in the summer - someone told me if you have them, you don't have rats because the rats drive them away and take over their homes - isn't that just like a rat??). But we do get mice in the basement sometimes. Squeaks (The World's Most Beautiful Calico) catches them and brings them upstairs for me to play with. She loves to share. I've actually gotten quite good at putting three or four gloves on my right hand and grabbing them while they're still stunned, then rushing outside and flinging them off the deck before they can get their sharp lil mousey teeth through more than two of the gloves.

    Life in the suburbs is so much fun. Always something to do.

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  5. MeApril 5, 2009 at 10:43 AM

    YE-uck! No fun.

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  6. Tristan RobinApril 5, 2009 at 11:37 AM

    what exactly does a Rat Zapper do? Does it electrocute them? Is there a mini-guillotine in there?

    I hate rats - and I only consider squirrels one half a step higher. Cut off that cute tail and do you have? a RAT.

    Though, I have to admit that cartoon about the gourmet rat was quite clever.

    *shudder*

    rats. arrghhhhhhh

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  7. KBeauApril 5, 2009 at 12:47 PM

    Do they make a squirrel zapper? We don't have problems with rats, but we do have squirrels in the attic. At Christmas one kept getting in the wall of one of the bedrooms upstairs. Larry and I were sleeping there because we gave his mother our main level bedroom. We finally had to move to an air mattress in the den.

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  8. shrink on the couchApril 5, 2009 at 1:39 PM

    An electric chair for rats? KEWWWWLLLLL!

    We had a terrible season of rats. Our whole n'hood. We use the poison in a black plastic box method (rat hotel).

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  9. cactus petuniaApril 5, 2009 at 2:47 PM

    Is a Rat Zapper like a bug zapper? Do you lie awake at night listening to it buzz?

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  10. Queenly ThingsApril 6, 2009 at 10:03 AM

    Sometimes it's hard to share this world with some of its critters.

    ReplyDelete