Rats

[Wussername]

I have just been hit by two bills from my garage, one for £440 and today £360. Rats eating the wiring. Thus immobilising the car on each occasion.

Have any boat owners experienced rat damage

Andrew

[ranworthbreeze]

7 minutes ago, Wussername said:

I have just been hit by two bills from my garage, one for £440 and today £360. Rats eating the wiring. Thus immobilising the car on each occasion.

Have any boat owners experienced rat damage

Andrew

Hi Andrew, 

I have no experience of rats with cars, but I used to be on standby working on loan to Batchelors Foods, there were loads of rats that would climb inside trunking and eat the insulation off of the cables, we had to make temporary repairs be taping the cables until new runs of cables could be installed. 

Regards

Alan

[Thiswan]

25 minutes ago, Wussername said:

I have just been hit by two bills from my garage, one for £440 and today £360. Rats eating the wiring. Thus immobilising the car on each occasion.

Have any boat owners experienced rat damage

Andrew

1

Not a boat but we discovered the kitchen waste pipe eaten through in the cavity wall only found out when we wondered where the wastewater was going when it didn't appear outside  I've put big traps down and a man came with bait boxes but they are craftier than that. Thinking of getting a couple of Jack Russells dogs as our Labrador is a bit slow and soft. And I thought life would be easy moving to the countryside!

 

BTW you can get an Aerosol to spray on cables but don't breathe it in for goodness sake!

[scraggs]

Not on a boat. but have had them chomp through part of the wiring loom on a teleporter forklift, and through the cables in a timber framed house.
Neosorexa gold generally sorts the little buggers out.

[Lulu]

Recently had a lone rat in our loft. It chomped through cardboard boxes and bubblewrap.  We got the pest controller out who laid a load of bait boxes and Mr Roland Rat is no more.  Hate rats, he wasnt invited

[vanessan]

43 minutes ago, Wussername said:

I have just been hit by two bills from my garage, one for £440 and today £360. Rats eating the wiring. Thus immobilising the car on each occasion.

Have any boat owners experienced rat damage

Andrew

Yes, on our cars! We were away for 4/5 weeks on holiday in Australia and came back to find one car just wouldn’t start. We called the RAC who eventually established chewed wiring. The same thing happened to the other car on our next trip! This was around 15 years ago so I guess our attempts, whatever they were, to get rid of the little b*****s must have worked. 

[JennyMorgan]

It is not unknown for rats to desert a sinking ship!

Quaint Broads custom is for friends to sprinkle small bits of meat onto the roof of their mate's boat in the early hours. This should ensure that the patter of rats feet crossing the cabin roof will wake them up! A few bits of fish guts or heads is even more effective as hoards of seagulls settle on the cabin roof as the sun comes up, indeed that can be quite dramatic! Perhaps more subtle is bits of bread in order to attract ducks. The sound of rats on the roof is perhaps the most unnerving but does tend to stretch a friendship to its limit! 

[Thiswan]

I know I'm stupid I hate having to kill anything living. Rats are fascinating creatures that are in the wrong place they are good parents and nurse injured members of their family etc, but they are really nasty when caged I won't tell you what one of them said to me!

I know it's a case of them or the health of my family but I still hate doing it (Should have been a Buddist or something!).

[JennyMorgan]

Living near the water we take rats for granted, just a fact of life. I'm aware of them, see the evidence but apart from nibbled fences have never been inconvenienced by them, yet. However, don't get me started on otters and mice, arghhhhhh!

[Malanka]

Are the garage sure it wasn’t pine Martens?

They are notorious for eating cables and pipes and wires in cars. Way more than rats are.

Rat traps won’t  get a marten they are way too smart.

M

if you have a dog and it didn’t go wild near the car from the smell then it wasn’t rats. Ours go bonkers on acid when they find one. Boris accidentally ripped a hole in one of Bootsies ears when they were arguing over who gets to rip the rat to bits.

[dnks34]

Ouch not an expense anyone wants. 

Where I grew up in Germany we had these things to contend with:

 http://www.living-in-germany.net/your-car-vs-the-marten/

Technically its vandalism but I bet insurance companies have a get out clause!

[Malanka]

Northern European Pine Martens are common a over the UK.

 

M

[JennyMorgan]

Pine Martins see here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/European_pine_marten

Thankfully not aware of pine martens in Norfolk.

[Wussername]

20 minutes ago, JennyMorgan said:

Pine Martins see here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/European_pine_marten

Thankfully not aware of pine martens in Norfolk.

None in Strumpshaw that's for sure.

Andrew

[JennyMorgan]

We do get the odd house martin though.

[ChrisB]

In my Native Chiltern Hills there is the King Chewer, the Glis Glis or Edible Dormouse.

This bu#*er did a load of damage in our home just before our purchasers Surveyor was due. 

 

[Happy]

Some years ago we had a garage in Dover.  One morning my son was carrying out an MOT on a people carrier that had been parked on a farm.

Whilst checking under the bonnet he stated that it looked as though a rat had chewed some of the wiring and as he was speaking the rat jumped out from under the bonnet, over his shoulder and ran out of the garage door.

He was pretty shocked.  The owner of the vehicle (which was a wreck) could not understand why he refused to carry on with the test and only pacified when I did not charge him!

[Baitrunner]

Did you eat it?

[Happy]

No!  Could not catch it!

[ChrisB]

The edible dormouse? No, too fiddly I think you would need two or three to make a meal.

[eddybear]

These 12 V gadgets can be bought on eBay  12V Car Electronic Ultrasonic Pest Control Repeller, Spiders Rats Mice, I already use a 250 V one in the boat, which Seems to work for spiders, so am buying a 12 V one when not plugged into the Shore power.

[eddybear]

PS two last Post reading the write-up on these they were originally intended for and wired for cars to Stop rodents eating the wiring

[TheQ]

We had rats eat throught the floor, of the model railway shed I was building, I hadn't even got the doors or roof on!!!! It's been a constant battle with them. The last lot that broke in, also chewed their way into a tub of rat poison!!

They've chewed a hole in the conservatory door, and into the door frame of the from door of the house.

Every year when harvest time comes we get invaded..

[Gretzky]

A friend of mine had mice on his boat a few years ago. They got in under the floor and ate though some wiring. No doubt attrached by some other individuals leaving waste in bin liners around in the marina. We had both rats and mice about until it was all cleared up, remove the food remove the problem. I had mice get into my storage box not too much damage just chewed up a rod slip and a couple of cleaning rags. I ended up putting traps down until the waste was removed and the indiviuals who left them mess were moved on from the marina.

[MauriceMynah]

I had a mouse on my boat once. All he did was leave s $h1t review on Trip Advisor.