Kitchen Garden Forum

Had a visit from a rat so looked at getting a humane rat trap catch & release a few miles away type.

Research showed this comment….
“We called out local authoritiy pest control and a very knowledgeable lady told us it is illegal to take rats to any new location. If you catch them humanely you still have to then kill them with a bash to the head with a hammer. You can't set them free.”

Wondering if this is correct as there are catch & release traps for sale.

True for grey squirrels.

Rats are indigenous, so I doubt that is true, Grey Squirrels are not so must be killed.

I've just googled rats there is no mention of having to release them

Hi Colin!

Kill the rat by whatever your preferred method. For a start there is never one & if left there will be many more as they breed constantly. That's from experience from having chicken keepers near me at the allotment & seeing the damage & totally demolition they do to my crops, not to mention the droppings & stuff on my crops that remain which have to be binned as well.

Rats do unfortunately carry a lot of problems with their habits, destructive and also carry disease.

Have only seen this once no sign of it in shed or green house only up the tree where I have bird feeders which I suspect is what it was after.

You may think I am old townie softy as I would prefer to catch live and relocate it in some lovely woods many miles away.

Putting down poison is not an option as have an inquisitive dog, the trip type can trap other wild life as well.

There are humane traps that catch things alive I have three one is in our garden which I bait with poison blocks they will kill rodents but not wild life or our dog yesterday I found 2 extremely large slugs eating the poison ,the other 2 are normally down the plot around my chicken coup but at the moment my mate has borrowed one

I've caught a rather large angry rat in a new humane trap that I put out last night. I thought about drowning it in the water butt as I don't like violence but I daren't pick the trap up so my son will have to despatch it when he gets home. The squirrels are a terrible problem this year too. They've had most of the walnuts and yesterday cleared almost every apple off the Falstaff tree which had a really good crop. They've left three whole apples and three half eaten ones. Goodness knows what they've done with all the rest it will be a wonder if they can move if they've eaten them all but I can't find any hidden anywhere and they were quite large for them to carry them away.

I've been looking this up and you can release or dispose of rats anywhere or by any method you like so long as you don't cause unnecessary suffering. You can't use snares, explosives or cross bows though however tempting it would be to blow the damned things up.

Plumpudding tie a string around the handles of the trap when you drop it into your water but keep hold of the string it makes getting the trap back easier, if the squirrels are grey ones they are vermin very easy to shoot with an air rifle but only if you are a better marksman than myself

Rat humanely killed and one squirrel shot. Dread to think how many more there are. Good job it isn't hot weather as it isn't bin day until next week.

Make him shoot for his tea

I'd thought about tying something to the handles but really didn't want to do the deed Robo. Not sure if my son would eat squirrel pie but he has his own house so I don't usually cook for him anyway. I wonder what it tastes like?

They seem to love it on the Alaskan programs on the telly