Saw a rat in my back garden - what's next?

[gchalix]

I am so totally freaking out right now! Was doing the washing up and looking out of the window when I saw it.

Rats are my worst nightmare and I've never seen one in such close proximity. My back garden is really small as well and I'm terrified they're going to find their way in my house.

What do I do now?

@ClareBlue

We get muntjac in our garden (town centre but there's a large wild garden 2 houses over as the property has been vacant 20 years and a community centre garden with wild patches next door) and pheasant and partridge. We have mice, frogs, bats, all manner of tweety birds and a pair of squawking magpies nesting in a nearby tree. No rats yet, but a gazillion spiders including those hideous woodlouse spiders (do not google if you hate arachnids. They're freakier than the huge black house spiders and now I have my feet off the floor )

I suspect you must be a neighbour and released them. Sadly I've not seen your geese.

Sometimes I wonder why I bothered moving from the countryside into a town.

It can be very upsetting to se a rat for the first time. Many people feel shock and slightly traumatised.

Just because you see one random rat in your garden doesn’t necessarily mean anything serious although there will of course be hundreds around. Unlike mice they roam 100 to 300 feet from their nests - unless they’ve got a very handy food source!

If you see signs on your property of a rat infestation you might want to take action and as others have said make sure they can’t get in the house.

I was once told that you're never more than 50 yeards from a rat! Is there any decking nearly, I'm told that that's one of the worst things for attracting rats.

Of course the other problem rats have is blatant racism.

Everyone assumes a rat is a rat but the Rattus rattus is not the same as the Rattus norvegicus and there is good evidence that the norvegicus has culturally appropriated aspects of rattus culture.

For example norvegicus used to be known as the sewer rat but that label is not now in common use due to appropriating the common rat label.

The influence this has had on the rattus population is best summed up by the 1977 Stanglers Album Rattus Norvegicus and the subsequent 1981 'Golden Brown' single.

It is no coincidence that the Norvegicus is a brown rat and the rattus is a black rat. Hence 'golden' brown.

@ClareBlue

You've just made me spit coke all over my lap top!! 😂😂😂

OP we have had a rat in our back garden for weeks, well did have, he's dead now for unknown reasons. Just found him in the middle of the garden. Was quite sad as we named him SuzieBob (Al a Friends). I digress, a friend who works for a pest control company said that has been a MASSIVE increase in rat sightings over the past 5 months. He puts it down to not that many people being out, so it's made them braver in their search for food during the day, and more sightings in and around home as people are at home more. He or she has probably always been around, you just haven't noticed before... Not that this will help with your phobia, but if you are really concerned a reputable pest controller should help.

And if you check the lyrics you will see reference to coming to the west (from Norway? ) and on a ship, well known for transporting rats, 'never a frown with golden brown' clearly stating the brown rat is not a threat like his cousin the Rattus rattus.

My cat brought one in through my bedroom window last weekend. I'm used to his 'gifts' but my fiancé was a gibbering wreck. They do say that you're never more than five meters away from a rat at any time. They're everywhere. Except for my house & garden because the cat's had them all.

Brilliant, ClareBlue

In her heyday, my lakeland terrier despatched one or two rats most weeks for quite some time. We only saw them when she left the bodies on the lawn, never saw a live one.

She's too old for that malarkey now, and last winter one got in the house. I woke up one night to hear a hissing sound, went downstairs to investigate and found the kitchen ankle deep in water. The bloody rat had chewed through the hose to the diswasher and it was spouting water like Old Faithful.

The rat then made its way into the loft, presumably because it wanted to keep its feet dry. The council came and put down bait and traps and we never saw any evidence of it again. We blocked up a few places where mortar had come away from the pointing, and filled every tiny gap where pipes enter or leave the house.

Funnily enough though, a colleague who lives a couple of hundred yards away got them in her house a few weeks later. They got the council out, and it turned out they'd got into her house through a broken drainage pipe and she had to have half her garden dug up and new drains laid.

They're everywhere round here. We're on the edge of open countryside and have 3 lots of stables (2 racing yards and a livery stable/riding school) within half a mile, and loads of people, including my NDNs, keep chickens.

As pp have said, make sure there is no available food source for them. They also like standing water, so check for broken drains, stagnant ponds, dripping taps etc., and they need cover, which is why they like to nest under sheds, decking and in untidy areas if the garden. The untidier the better for them. If your neighbouring gardens are like that, they may be the ones hosting them.

The cardboard might be attracting them if it gives them shelter. If it's been out in the rain, it may be wet enough to count as standing water.
Have a garden clear-up, get rid of the cardboard and deal with any untidy or wet areas. Clean the play equipment as well.

If you get a pest control company out, as well as dealing with the rats, they should be able to advise you whether you need to take any action to prevent them getting in the house. The chap who came out to me could practically sniff them out and identified holes I'd never even noticed that needed filling.

I've just seen one in my garden too OP. I've lived here nearly 17 years and never seen one here before. I'm not that from a canal where I see them on occasion, but never in the garden before. But I now have a garden office and it suddenly walked past. Was reasonably cute looking, nice fur!

If it was a squirrel, you'd think it was cute! But biologically they're not much different.
When I've seen the odd rat in my garden I do three things: remove any food sources (ie stop feeding the birds), remove any water sources (bird bath etc) and also have a good clear out, cutting back and clearing the flower beds, sweeping paved areas, removing clutter and leaves and moving pots around. That always seems to resolve the problem.

Oh god, we’ve got them too! DH opened our compost bin and one actually peeped out at him! I would have shit myself. I know this probably won’t go down well on MN but we’ve just put down some poison and will be booking the council to remove the compost bin. I’m not having them coming into my home and having to pay for a rewire because they’ve gnawed on everything eeew 🤮🤮

Rats get a bad press but whilst they are vectors for some disease and are incontinent so their urine drips on worksurfaces they run across

Rats aren't incontinent, ours were litter trained. But they do scent mark with urine, males being the worst.
I'm surprised at some of the horror expressed here, they make lovely pets (though you should never tame a wild one as they carry leptospirosis).
There are always rats outside and routinely poisoning them because you live in the country is terrible. If they become a problem call a pest controller, but just seeing one is not a cause for alarm.

Write a songs about it like UB40

Rats are squirrels without the magnificent tails. Every time you see a rat, call it a European Tailless Brown Squirrel. It will help.

Also, here is a video of domesticated rats driving little cars.

Ok so I am now an expert on this matter after killing a massive colony of rats which were under my decking recently.

Like you I had never seen a rat in my garden, until lockdown. Apparently they are moving away from restaurants/shops because lockdown has forced their food source away.

So they are now prevalent in residential areas where they don't usually go. I noticed a rat in my garden on 3 occasions. Then opened my cereal packet in the kitchen and it was all gone!! They'd been in my house eating my cereal, they then ate my super noodles the following night.

I phoned the rat man from the council and he laid a load of poison under the kitchen cupboards. I got restless and bought a load of extra poison and was putting cubes just near the opening of the decking. Every 20 mins or so it was disappearing, so I put more out. After 3 days they were all dead and I've put tons of rat killer under the decking.

I usually like the humane approach but after they ate our cereal and noodles, I freaked out and wanted them all dead.

Good luck, they were easier to get rid of than I thought they'd be but if you go the humane route, they'll out populate your efforts.

Keep an eye on it, longtimecomin - other rats will move in if they see an opportunity, and they love decking.

When I see rats (we have chickens, you get the odd rat), I just remind myself that they are superior ‘country rats’ so it’s fine 😂 The cats around here take care of the majority. I’ve not seen one for ages actually.

You saw a wild animal outside? Leave it? Rats are everywhere outside.

They ate supernoodles? Well that should see them off...

We've had a rat problem in recent months and it's driving us mad. It started with seeing them in the garden. Then the bold lil feckers moved into the house. Had pest control in and all was calm for a while. They are now getting into the kitchen somehow and despite numerous investigations we just can't figure out the entry hole. I'm seriously considering ripping out the kitchen as they are either living in a cavity wall and getting in from a hidden hole or tunnelling their way in from somewhere (checked behind kickboards and can't see anything). No droppings at all but like @longtimecomin we had cereal and noodles nibbled on. Then they shredded packets of lentils. We did a biscuit test and the entire thing was gone. Pest control guy wasn't great at really indentifying the source of the problem when we called him the first time so I don't want to pay £££s again.

Have started putting poison down so hoping to see some corpses soon (sorry rat lovers but I've reached the end of my tether).

Just seen another one outside this afternoon. There are loads of cats around here, they are obviously too well fed to deal with them :)

Seeing 'Rattus Rattus' written down has reminded me of Horrible Histories which was narrated by a rat ...he was called either 'Accurat' or 'Rattus Rattus'....he was really cute...my kids loved that show...

@Drat123 dying from poisoning is a horrible death. Search thoroughly for an access point rather than using poison.