Rats burrowing under my pad/slab

[g17jimmy]

I just noticed this past weekend that I have rats burrowing under my garage floor from outside. I've ordered bait stations so that will hopefully take care of the rodent problem, but what about the burrows? I don't think voids under the concrete are a good thing. How do I resolve this issue?

Thanks!

Pic of one of the entrances

 

[lostmind]

Have you seen rats? could be ground hog or skunk. Rats are easiest , they'll take the bait. Might need to get a cage trap to find out what you're dealing with. If you catch them at this stage , you probably don't have to do anything but fill the hole the best you can.
If they have a separate exit , probably ground hog , then they can undermine the slab if
left alone.

 

[sselander]

For my shed, I dug a trench and fastened hardware cloth in an inverted L to the sides of the wood. This way when they dig down they encounter the hardware cloth.

 

[Scott H in Wheaton]

Don't worry too much about the burrows, they will be full of dead rat bodies

 

[RivennHewn]

Rats are everywhere.

Just 'cuz you don't see them, doesn't mean they aren't there.

 

[g17jimmy]

Have you seen rats? could be ground hog or skunk. Rats are easiest , they'll take the bait. Might need to get a cage trap to find out what you're dealing with. If you catch them at this stage , you probably don't have to do anything but fill the hole the best you can.
If they have a separate exit , probably ground hog , then they can undermine the slab if
left alone.

I have seen the rats. I wasn't sure when I first saw the holes, bc they are rather large, but it's definitely rats.

The bad thing is I can't just "get rid of food" bc the food they are after is my goat's food. So I expect this will be a continual problem, but if I can get the ones under my pad gone , fill the burrows properly, and seal off as best I can, I can deal with animals outside, just not in or under my garage.

 

[Truman Sparks]

Rodinator:

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[g17jimmy]

For my shed, I dug a trench and fastened hardware cloth in an inverted L to the sides of the wood. This way when they dig down they encounter the hardware cloth.

I've been pondering this, too.

 

[sselander]

something like this, is what I have. Make sure it is hardware cloth. Bend the cloth into an L before fastening it.

 

[Jagmandave]

I've had the same problem with chipmunks, first it was under my driveway, so I had it mudjacked back into place - they can't dig thru that mud but they can go right nesx to it - which is what they did, under my garage floor which has now dropped in one place almost 2", in another it's cracked and dropped in the center!

I've been trapping them like crazy, as many as 20-30 in a summer, I have no idea where they're all coming from!

I'm going to have the floor raised again in the spring, then I'm going to bait.

 

[rburke65]

C-a-t

 

[dbabicky]

Flood them bastards out. Use antifreeze also.

 

[pfhWJ]

a coupe of good fireworks and wait on the other side with a baseball bat

 

[BD1]

Get this bar bait and keep feeding this into the opening. This works great along with my cats in the barn. If you have pets, I place one in a milk jug or bottle . Those Deans quart chocolate jugs are perfect.

http://www.valleyvet.com/ct_detail.html?pgguid=ee2ab972-97ad-4344-87b3-139363a41e3e

 

[Majordisorder]

You could adapt some 2" plastic pipe and hose or whatever it takes to adapt your car or truck exhaust and direct it in the tunnel for 15 or 20 minutes. Small mammals cant take much CO.

 

[03HD-F150]

I had a groundhog make a HUGE hole under my old barn. When I tore it down I decided to put in a 24" rat wall with the slab. So far so good.

I was amazed at how huge of a home he made. could only see a small hole from the side, but when I tore up the slab there was a 6'x6' den about a foot deep.

 

[ZRX61]

Mothballs, as mentioned in every thread about rodent issues.

 

[Packard V8]

Takes me back to when I was about 10-12 years old. Mother was complaining about some gophers which had tunneled under the house and were eating her flowers.

Being a typical bloodthirsty country boy of the age, I knew the explosive properties of carbide pellets. When dampened with water, they produce acetylene gas, which powered miner's lamps in the pre-battery-powered-everything days.

So, anyway, push some carbide back into the rat hole, wet it with a hose, close the hole with dirt and wait a few minutes until the acetylene gas traveled back through the tunnel. Then, open the hole and toss in a match. Very satisfying explosion and some fried rats. Do you have an oxygen/acetylene torch setup?

No warranty expressed or implied. Your results may vary.

jack vines

 

[67carl]

I've got a wood deck that the skunks love to get under. The stink would wake me up in the middle of the night in summer. I got some chicken wire and installed it like the hardware cloth in the picture above. I made sure I cut a slit in the wire and bent the jagged edges out so it could squeeze out but not get back in. I also bought a couple gallons of ammonia at the hardware store and would periodically pour some around the edge of the decking and places around the perimeter fence where they might come through. After a few days I wired the opening shut and no problems since.

 

[g17jimmy]

All good stuff. Thanks guys. I'll get the bait stations put out this weekend and then I'll have to see about getting the burrows filled once I kill the f**kers. Then find out about getting the burrows filled, and then blocked off with hardware cloth.

Always something to do...

 

[dos zetas]

My friend in St Paul had this problem- she went to the pound and got a rat terrier, a fine breed of dog- it killed 22 the first day.

 

[Bunchgrass]

a coupe of good fireworks and wait on the other side with a baseball bat

You'll have a better chance hitting a Nolan Ryan fastball. Humans have incredibly slow reflex times

Also - if you decide to trap them (like using leghold traps) beware! They are nasty aggressive boogers.

 

[g17jimmy]

My friend in St Paul had this problem- she went to the pound and got a rat terrier, a fine breed of dog- it killed 22 the first day.

My lab wants to get at them, he's just not quick enough. I also have a lazy-*** cat that lives out doors, but she's worthless on catching animals, too.

 

[kbs2244]

You might be able to use a thermal imager to find temp differences that will show any voids.

You should be able to get some idea of the size of the voids by checking the size of the piles of dirt they have pulled out.

But I wouldn’t worry about it if you used a good amount of rebar when you poured the slab.

 

[Sims5]

Ever heard of fly bait? Tractor Supply sells it. Buy some and mix it with Coke in a metal pie pan. Set near the area and keep all your pets away from it. You'll probably find what it is the next morning. Usually within 10' of the pan. I don't know this to work because I wouldn't want to harm any precious PITA animals but I've heard it works.

 

[kbs2244]

There are many ideas on *********** rats.
Chicago actually has city employees devoted to rat control.
A basic problem that many do not take into consideration is that there is a “Colony Mother” that never leaves the nest.
She is brought her food by others.
Very much like a Queen Bee and Worker Bees.
You have to get any poison back to her.
Until you kill her, they can just keep breeding.
The best and lowest cost solution I have seen is mixing baking soda and peanut butter.
They love the peanut butter but the baking soda will kill them.

 

[g17jimmy]

I bought 6 Protecto Sidekick bait/poison stations and anchored them around the garage, out of reach of the goats. I can't get rid of the goat food entirely but I did build a food trough well away from the area where the rats are burrowing so that hopefully they will go for the bait and not the food.

I'm thinking about what kbs2244 says, making a bait/poison they can carry back to the burrow for any rats that aren't foraging. I'm also thinking about making a scaled up version of this:

http://i.imgur.com/gkRQdRh.gif



pics of the garage build: http://www.garagejournal.com/forum/showthread.php?t=11919

other pics of the garage: http://imgur.com/a/BZbGF

 

[jkwilson]

Bait stations need to stay out year round to prevent them getting set up.

I cram the bait chunks into the hole and then cover with dirt. As long as they keep digging it out I keep packing it full.

You can also stick a pipe in the hole, pack dirt around it and then connect the pipe to the exhaust of an internal combustion engine for a faster kill.

I rig a small concrete form around the hole when I'm convinced they are dead, and pour a wet mix into the form. The form gives you some height so you can get gravity to help it flow.

I've thought about building a giant caulk gun to push mortar into the voids. Maybe a piece of 6" schedule 40 with a wooden plunger that you could push with 30psi air and a nozzle made of reducers and a piece of 1" on the end.

 

[kbs2244]

If you manage to find the home nest void a mud jacking co will be able to fill it and any tunnels out to the edge of the slab.
They will have to drill a 2 inch hole in the floor over the void.

Maybe post someone at the holes in case there are some survivors chased out by the mud jacking grout.

 

[Danglide]

that rodinater looks like more fun than any of the other solutions...

 

[RPH]

They make a smoke bomb that's used to kill the rodents. Light the fuse and place in hole, works best with escape holes plugged.

 

[May Pop]

Ive also heard of lighting a road flare then stuff it into the hole. Uses all the oxygen and if that does not kill em the smoke does.

 

[M17715]

They make a smoke bomb that's used to kill the rodents. Light the fuse and place in hole, works best with escape holes plugged.

I'd try this first. And maybe the exhaust pipe on the car. Then I would go with the water hose. If you fill the place up with water, they have to come out. We did this once and ran every rat off.

 

[nicksnothereman]

Rats tend to be rascals. I didn't think they burrowed underground, maybe in colder areas though. The thing is it will end up being a perpetual problem. Fill the holes, they'll dig more. Gotta store that food somewhere else or potentially find a way to mask or eliminate their ability to smell it (baking soda? Sealed non-permeable containers?).

 

[kidney]

Get a couple rattle snakes. Then when the rat problem is gone get a mongoose to take care of your snake problem.

I'm not too sure what to use for the mongoose problem, though.

At least you will be free of the rats!

 

[Brad54]

Get a daschund (Weiner dog).
They are hell on rats.

For the food, start looking on Craigslist for a big job-site tool box--one of the big steel ones. Store your food in there.

I wouldn't use water to chase the rats out--you could end up eroding the tunnels and end up with your living room looking like the Corvette museum.

I'd be careful about using car exhaust too-- it could seep up into the house through the slab. Also, I'd rather not have ten pounds or more of dead, rotting meat under my house... that tends to stink a bit.

Traps, poison, and a mean little weiner dog, then hire a mud-jacking company to fill the burrows.

-Brad

 

[Cadillac fan]

I hear dynamite is the best method. You should try it. I am sure it will solve your rat problem......

 

[Lippyp]

I used to rent a barn with a friend to use as a workshop. It was on a farm next to a massive grain store and the rats were as big as cats. They were becoming a real problem and there was too many to hit with a shovel (as the occasional one that showed its nose got) The concrete slab must have been riddles with tunnels so one day we blocked as many as we could find with old rags or a shovel full of soil and then stuck a hose up the exhaust of a car and the other end wedged down the biggest hole. W3e left it running for a couple of hours whilst we worked outside, there was fumes seeping up all over. Rat problem got a lot better and we poured concrete down all the holes we could find inside.

Every so often the farmer would have the ratcatcher up, he would set up with two Jack Russels and a silenced air rifle, put some bait out and dispose of a load there and then and before he left put down poison as well. The rats would largely dissapear for a while but they would always come back eventually.

My problem is a badger set under one of my outbuildings, they must have excavated at least a ton of soil from under the slab this winter alone. Problem is they are protected by law here so theres little I can do about it.

 

[Standard Gas&Oil]

Be careful with over the counter baits, Bait shyness will happen and then they will never eat a lethal dose. I would recommend to use snap traps and pick them off one by one at first then install the bait boxes later. I would not even bother with the screen because if they want they will burrow down under the screen to get in. install some bait directly into the burrow then install a large stone to keep other animals out of it.

 

[Standard Gas&Oil]

There are many ideas on *********** rats.
Chicago actually has city employees devoted to rat control.
A basic problem that many do not take into consideration is that there is a “Colony Mother” that never leaves the nest.
She is brought her food by others.
Very much like a Queen Bee and Worker Bees.
You have to get any poison back to her.
Until you kill her, they can just keep breeding.
The best and lowest cost solution I have seen is mixing baking soda and peanut butter.
They love the peanut butter but the baking soda will kill them.

False, Baking soda will not kill rats. I own a pest control company and if this worked It would be so much cheaper and safer to use baking soda instead of expensive rodenticides.