We purchased some RatSak poison sachets and followed the instructions for placing the baits. You should place the poison baits in hard to reach places. Obviously you don’t want the poison to be eaten by anything other than the rats and mice so you may wish to place the poison under a cover such as a plastic plant pot with a hole cut out of it. These plastic things are also pretty good for deploying snail pellets throughout the garden.
We put the baits on the fence post we had seen the rats use as an access way as well as dropping two through the cracks of the decking down to where Paddy thinks the rats might live.
The next day the most unexpected thing happened. The rats had liked the baits so much they decided to dig a new entry to their house and drag the poison sachet back to the nest.
Rat hole
Oh, and another broccoli was completely stripped. I’m pretty sure two or three cherry tomatoes hanging low on the vine were also missing…
I stuck the remaining poison sachet deep in the hole and waited to see what happened the next day.
The next day the hole was clear (the sachet having presumably been taken back to the nest) but another brocolini was stripped leaving only two plants remaining un-nibbled.
I went to Bunnings to get more RatSak. The instructions say that the baits can take four to six days and that you should keep restocking taken baits so I bought another 5 baits and deployed them in the same spots. The next night the baits that i could see were untouched. The bait Paddy and I stuffed in the rat’s tunnel was still there so I figured it might be having effect..
No more broccolis were eaten but the other pea seedling was stripped bare.
Paddy and I were entertaining guests one night when all of a sudden a mouse ran out of the hole and stopped in front of us just next to the limestone garden wall
It was a normal mouse but it was obviously very groggy from eating the rat poison it was so sick we were able to catch it just by dropping a plastic microwave container over it.
Like all cute mice it looked at me as if to say “why.. you… poison.. mee?” and I felt my friends look at me like the Butcher of Kensington for poisoning such cute little mice.
We weren’t sure what to do with the mouse. It was obviously very sick and probably dying from the poison. In a rare Lord Of The Flies moment my friend offered to help it on it’s way with the aid of a big stick but when we bumped the container the mouse looked a bit more lively so we figured it might have a chance.
The mouse
We gave the mouse a reprieve from the big stick by letting it go in a box of box of books sitting on our verge awaiting council pickup.
about 4 days later the next bait was taken.. I wonder how many more there are.. we only have two council pickups per year 😉
A protective fence around the rat trap
All up we’ve used 15 baits so far and the rats are still around. We’ve decided to deploy the rat trap, but this time we have built a protective fence around the trap to stop cats and indigenous fauna from stepping on it.