There's a huge rat in the bathroom. WTF do I do?!

[ChanandlerBongsNeighbour]

Second night in rented first floor flat. Went to the loo, as I was sitting down something caught my eye at the side, as I turned to look a HUUGE rat ran along the side of the bath towards me/the toilet. I screamed and ran out and it went behind the toilet. DH and I cautiously went back in (once he had recovered from the sight of me running out of the bathroom straight into the living room with my trousers and knickers round my knees!!). As we were discussing it, the rat peeked out from the cavity behind the toilet. Short term, we have barricaded the cavity behind the toilet with thick cardboard and shut the door and stuffed the gap under the door with cardboard. Can't get hold of letting agent. What happens now?

It might be someones pet?

reallybadidea ha I was just going to suggest a terrier.
Fmil has a Patterdale and she catches at least one rat per week. She lives on the edges of town where there are a lot of takeaways so lots of rats.

Call you're agency not the council, they are likely to have a contact with an pest control company, and are unlikely to pay any bill you give them unless they have given permission first?

That's what I thought thelionqueen Will wait until I've spoken to them (sternly!!) in the morning!!

The building is old, theee flats in our block. Two on ground floor and ours on first floor. Has a quirky layout, a lot of our walls/ceilings are sloping due to being in the eaves. Fuck, they could be anywhere in the roof/wall cavities!

Countess you mean fucker

I hate rats

You have my sympathies OP

Brillo pads Brillo pads Brillo pads (have lived in basement flats in London)

A baby rat once ran across my bare foot while I was sitting at my computer desk . It was a flat in a hotel staff quarters and was near the kitchen so that's why they were hanging around (trying to cadge food). Was bloody horrible though (although not as bad as the other day when I stepped barefoot onto a slug and it exploded between my toes).

Ok op keep calm!...Iv dealt with a couple of loose animals in my home.

1st was BAT I found my cat sat staring at it face to face (funny they actually looked the same 😄) I managed to scoop it out the door with a dressing gown over my head.
My partner was scared shitless and could not move.

2nd was a bird which had flew out of our loft hatch. It was flying about upstairs (really smelly 🤢) and I had to use a bucket and towel to catch it and get it outside..again my wuss of a partner was too scared to help.

I would suggest you get a bucket and something like a large piece of cardboard. And some wellies. Use something to cover the entrance when you open the door a little and throw a bucket over it..breathe and then use the cardboard to pick it up and seal up the bucket (like catching a spider) then either take it outside or tip the bucket onto its side and slowly release the cardboard over the hole it got out of, then use as many things as possible to block the hole.

Good luck

If you have one you will have more. Pest control ASAP.

and flamethrower.

As far as I can tell it is trapped in the cavity behind the toilet. It's a built in toilet but down by the u bend at the back there's a bloody great gap in the woodwork! We have blocked the hole as best we could using what we had to hand (loads of cardboard from all the new house bits we've been buying!).

The cardboard is proper wedged in tight, and again cardboard wedged under the door to fill the gap at the bottom (although I think from the size of the rat it would have a job fitting under the door but you never know!!).

Bloody paranoid now that I can hear it chomping its way through though!

I would move house asap. honestly.

are you sure sure its a rat and not a big mouse?

Did you get a chance to ask previous tenants when you viewed the place if they'd experienced vermin infestation?

Wire wool might be better for blocking

I found a massive dead rat in the bottom of our black bin after we had been away for a couple of weeks, this coincided with a big massive pile of earth behind our house (left from a couple of houses being built behind us) being removed to build another house. It had been there a couple of years so the pest man thought thier nest had been disturbed and because we were away they made there way to our house where it was quiet
I was in the kitchen and one ran across the floor. Found a tiny hole by the back door.
Council sent a pest control man out who put down traps and showed us gaps around the exterior of the house to fill up with wire wool and expanding foam.
The poison worked but unfortunatly a rat died under the bath, was a horrible smell.
No signs of anything since thank god.

You shouldn't have blocked the hole.
It will find another exit. Next time, it will more than likely come up through the toilet. (rats do that, they're good swimmers) It could even be when you're sat on the toilet.
Sorry.

www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-3201526/Watch-quickly-rat-wriggle-toilet-Terrifying-video-reveals-rodents-navigate-pipes-home.html

I had rats in my bedsit back in the 90s. It was in the bathroom and we suspected was getting in via the back of the toilet. We got a huge empty margarine tub and filled it with poison - we left it in the bathroom overnight. The next morning we opened the door and the tub had COMPLETELY disappeared... not a trace of poison or the tub. We moved out shortly afterwards (the mice staring nonchalantly back at us when we pulled the grill pan out was also slightly off-putting 😄)

Aw fuck you lot this is a horrible thread for poor op. and me
It might be a horrible night for you op but first thing in the morning call kim yong un the agency and yell them to bring out a nuke exterminator

First of all, there is never 1 rat. Never.

Second of all, they are seriously intelligent, and persistent, little fuckers.

I recommend grated chocolate (chunks will not work), with poison laced through it. They (again, it's not one) will eat the lot.

I have had to do this a couple of times. I don't like it, but it works. I have had no problem at all with any dead carcass smells.

Good luck!

Hope your evening is rat free so far OP!

So google tells me that disturbance in the drains can spread rats out! All the main road drains in the street at the end of the road were being worked on by big lorries and teams last night, maybe this has sent a few homeless rats wandering?

No sign of anything more yet although I am switching every single light on when I need to go anywhere and doing a pathetic skippy run thing past the offending bathroom door each time!!
All four of us are sleeping in the same bed tonight (won't matter as I won't be sleeping anyway!!).