To carry on feeding the birds even though rats have appeared in our garden?

So the tray is where the blue line is. It also doubles as a bird bath too.

We have a large tray underneath ours which catches the seed which the birds inevitably drop. It’s ontop of the dome thing that stops squirrels etc climbing the feeder pole.
We bring all feeders and empty the tray without fail every night. We also have bait boxes out to keep the rodent numbers down. Not seen a rat in over a year and no bait is being taken either.

If you see a rat, particularly in daylight, you can be sure that there are a lot of others nearby.
It is wonderful to love wildlife, and help the birds. But, in doing so, you are also inviting other visitors.
Rural area or not, many animals will generally choose the path of least resistance as far as food goes. In this instance, that's your garden.

Oooooh, we get a few squirrels too, who munch on the bird food - especially the nuts!

What do you mean?

I have cameras on all my bird feeders, I have a huge collection of species, highly recommend wildlife cameras. IV seen an owl snatch a beautiful little mouse off a high up bird feeder. A sparrowhawk visits occasionally. We did have a rat and I poured mint mouthwash (suggested my my farmer neighbour) and he moved to different part of garden, few nights later fox caught a rat on camera, nature is brutal. I also feed the fox and feral cat, helps keep rats & mice under control. We have pine martens vicious little buggers. Night cameras are fascinating so much wildlife. I am very rural. Pheasants nesting in my huge planter at moment it's wonderful. Rats are everywhere, I have terriers so one wouldn't last long if got into the house.

Hope you are feeding summer friendly food or they will choke their chicks......

ugh; i woul never do this to my squirrels.

Totally agree, @BatchCookBabe

@ahe2 At this time of the year birds are feeding their young so appreciate live mealworms. You could get one of those feeders that you stick to your window with suction pads to put the mealworms in - it's great seeing the sparrows and other small birds coming so close and the worms are gone in a flash so won't attract the rats. Robins and Starlings get used to you very quickly and will come to eat from your hands in a day or so. But the Robins can be very cheeky, if we leave the back door open I have walked into the kitchen to find "our" Robin sitting on the tap above the sink waiting for me to dish out the dinner. Once their young have fledged they stop visiting until next year and there are usually enough insects and berries around in the summer so I stop feeding the birds until winter.

Hell will freeze over before I stop feeding the birds. I love it. It's one of my hobbies. And there's no reason to not feed them in spring and summer. They have young/fledglings that they need to feed, and will appreciate the extra food. Also, there is less natural food, because we have fucked up their envionment and the planet, so the least we can do is help them a bit now.

I don't feed them as much in spring and summer.

And how exactly will a bird bath replace food?

I have seen one rat - one - in the 10 years I have been feeding the birds since we moved to this rural house, (and this was 2 summers ago,) and I have never had one in my house. Hilariously, a neighbour of mine, 5 doors away, got 2 rats in her house, even though she has never fed the birds in her life. Must have food waste over her kitchen floor! 😁

I get around 19-20 different types of bird in my (rather large) garden. They love it. 😃

Carry on feeding them. @ahe2 ... I would!

Yes, but the reason it's rare is because most people don't come into close contact with rats and actively try to get rid of them if they appear on their property.

If everyone was just allowing rats to roam freely around their gardens the number of cases would be a lot higher.

I don’t feed birds here, unless very cold weather, and we still have lots of birds. A robin always make an appearance when I am gardening/weeding/digging soil. We have a nest of swallow under the eaves of the garden shed. We often look out and see other birds also.

The birds need help this time of year, it’s silly to say they don’t. Insects and seeds are not readily available yet.

It goes even further than that. It's coming up to nesting time. When the adult birds are expending all their energy finding worms and grubs for ever hungry young mouths, it's enormously helpful to them to have an easy source of food for themselves.

If you leave doors open or have rat entry options, the rats will get into your house

This

You can get squirrel proof bird feeders that only let small birds feed.

also, you can get “hot spicy” bird food which mammals like rats won’t eat. Birds can’t taste spicy chilli at all but rats hate it and won’t eat bird food with cayenne pepper or other chilli mixed in.

They will run inside your house if you leave the doors open. Ground floor windows too.

My sisters neighbour had many bird feeders and several birds tables (none ground feeders), also woods behind their houses. She was told by the council she had to stop feeding the birds as it was causing a rat issue.

If you have 1 rat and baby you can bet there are MANY more there.

I also agree with the pp about the weils disease. Rats pee as they move about, basically incontinent. It is known that coming into contact with their pee is extremely dangerous in vatious ways and weils disease can be fatal. A cousins ex was seriously ill after working on a building site and contracting it. He did survive. No way would I risk my kids health.

I'd stop, not worth it. Or get a jack Russell.

We stopped feeding the birds because of rats. Next door feed them using bird feeders and I have watched a rat happily trot along the fence to get to a feeder. However it has got better now we have all stopped putting out food at low levels. Having had rats in the house and the expense of removing them and blocking entry points I'm not encouraging them back.

Robins love dried insects, which are pricey but worth the pleasure. Mine fly over hoping I have some.

The poster said it's "highly unlikely", and they are correct.

About as many people catch weils disease in the UK, per year, as are struck by lightning (and you're more likely to die from lightning).

Your boss's friend was the unlucky one-in-tens-of-millions.

Also, not all weils cases come from rats. A lot are due to exposure from livestock (and occasional cases where it's spread by a dog or other carrier). If you don't work with livestock, your risk is significantly lowered.

Use bird feeders hanging from trees

I thought you don't really need to feed birds except over winter. In spring/summer there's enough worms, bugs, min beasts for them to eat.

There was a gorgeous little robin the other morning at daybreak just hopping from pot to pot, picking out a worm from each one! I wish I got a photo.

I would certainly stop doing anything that could encourage rats. I hope pest control can advise or do something.