How long before a poisoned rat starts to smell?

[FragrantVagrant]

We've had trouble with a couple of rats getting into our house. One we eventually caught with a trap. Another one came in (we have now blocked up the hole, as much as we can!) and was nibbling the bottoms of our shelves etc even if we got rid of all the food from the kitchen, as well as destroying other things.

We resorted to poison which we think it has eaten quite a bit of now over a few days (it has steadfastly avoided all of many different traps even those right outside its hiding places). It goes behind the cupboards and under the floor boards and we never see it and rarely hear it.

We didn't want poison originally as we thought it'd die where we can't see or get at it so would start to rot and smell. However we've not had much choice. Just wondering if anyone's had experience of this and if they start to smell - how long does it last and when can we expect it?! It's in our kitchen so might affect Christmas and we have lots of visitors .

A dead rat would begin to smell pretty quickly I'd have thought, 3-4 days maybe. When the cats lost a dead mouse under the sofa the smell alerted us within a couple days, starting out as a slight off smell to begin with but rapidly increasing to very strong and impossible ignore over the course of a day. I'm sure you'll soon know if the poison got it!

Thank you, that's helpful! I'm weirdly impatient to smell it so I can at least plan to put all the food back in the kitchen!

They don't always smell. Poison will usually mummify them.

Its a sickly sweet smell that isnt pleasant and gets really strong and lingers.

You can buy these bags online that soak up the smell and help with that. We used one in my mums house where a rat died in the wall cavity. Really helped.

Cant remember whats its called but a quick Google search will bring them up.

Oh and we stopped using poison because of that and as they were in the attic laid down sticky pads which they got stuck to and checked daily to remove any caught.

Sticky pads!? I was saying there should be such a thing! Thanks!

Yes got them off amazon. Its not very humane as they starve to death or try to chew themselves off, hence why we checked everyday. You can then release them off the sticky pads with water or oil I think.

For us we didn't want to use poison the second time because of that first time where one died in the wall and the smell.