Rat in my garden

[simonneilsbeautifulhair]

While my daughter was reading quietly in the garden on Friday, she saw a rat. We have a small tidy patio with not many hiding places and as soon as she moved the rat disappeared under our back gate.

I've checked the garden but can't find any evidence of rats but I think they must be living in an overgrown path at the back of our garden that runs down the back of the whole terrace but is very overgrown and some pepper have dumped rubbish like an old radiator, a bike etc out there. I have asked someone to come and cut back the bit behind my house as I've got the fear that it's a massive rat hotel in the shrub however several other properties will still have overgrown bits next door and further down, and I'm not paying for it all to be trimmed back as I can't afford that! Really worries about rats getting into my garden and then potentially my house!

Is the path likely to be council owned? (It's a row of about 20 Victorian terraces and the path runs all the way along behind the back gardens) If so hopefully they can locate and get rid of the rats and maybe even clear the rest of the path.

There are always rats around. As long as they aren't in your house, why worry? Presumably this is the first time one has made its presence known, you may never see one again. Don't worry about it.

I used to have cats and occasionally a cat would bring a rat in through the cat flap. If it was dead I wasn't bothered but once there was a live rat which escaped. I had fun and games trying to catch it but isolated it in the kitchen, left the back door open and it went out.

I've never seen them running around the back garden but I know rats exist outdoors and in sewers. That's life.

Rats are basically looking for food. If they don't find any they won't move in, so it sounds as if the patio won't be much of an attraction, and if you're careful about food storage, crumbs etc in the house, you should have no worries there. If you are worried, seek out any holes (eg round pipes) and block them with steel wool.

The path may be Council owned, in which case you can ask them to clear it - but bear in mind the expenses of Coronavirus mean many Councils are struggling even to meet their statutory duties - or it may belong to the houses, ie each owner owns the bit of path at the end of their garden.