I'm a rat owner...sort of. I caught an Eastern woodrat in (appropriately) my woodshop. Evidence of her residency became apparent before I even knew she was there. Cords and wires were severed, and almost every one of them looked like it was cut with a sharp blade, not chewed. A couple of the severed plugs were nowhere to be found. I started losing halfway-finished projects. Pen turning is the latest facet of woodworking I'm trying to perfect, and the hardest part is trying to get the perfect shine. Sometimes, I'll work on polishing several pen barrels at a time before I assemble them, but production was halted when I started losing pen barrels. And drill bits. And one half of a yo-yo I was making from purpleheart. Then my broom started balding; half its bristles were gone. The only two people that set foot in my shop regularly are 14-year-old son, and my neighbor, Jamie. I was getting plenty heated, trying to figure out which one of them thought he was doing something hilarious.
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I guess I should be flattered that my efforts have been met with approval from the most discerning aficionados of shiny loot.
Then I found the first pack rat stash while I was straightening up the shop. Everything was just piled in one corner, even the broom bristles and electrical cords. I also found several blue shop towels, a lot of used segments of sandpaper rolls I had used on the lathe and tossed to the floor, packing peanuts, a pack of Jamie's cigarettes that was still halfway full, my new torch lighter that was only three days old when I lost it, several crushed aluminum cans (I recycle), some unused wood pen blanks I had actually ordered online and paid quite a bit for (Gaboon ebony is a frightfully expensive wood!) and one of my Kobalt screwdrivers. Even after finding the mess, I still had no idea how in the world everything had wound up in the corner. A few nights later, my shop guest made her first appearance. I work nights because Louisiana heat is murder when it's married to Louisiana humidity, and I was sitting at the workbench when she appeared two feet away from where I was sitting, smelled me, and scampered off. I had no idea what she was. I had never seen a rat before. I don't recall seeing one even in a pet store. She didn't look like any of the rats I had seen in movies or on TV, so I resumed my work, and thought about rodents.
A couple of nights after she made her debut, I saw her again around midnight, and texted Jamie. He had just gone to bed but decided that mystery rodents were more interesting...and he never has anything important to do, anyway. He brought a squirrel trap with him that looks like it was made before the wheel was invented. He ignored my suggestions to oil it, baited it with peanut butter, and set it a couple of feet from where I found the stash. Less than five minutes later, the rat came out, crawled into the trap without hesitation, and gleefully started grazing on peanut butter, perched right on top of the trip mechanism. I tapped Jamie, who stood up saw what was happening. It took about four seconds for him to realize what was happening, but once the light clicked on, he got mad and hollered something about "Yer not gettin' a free meal ya *******!" as he flailed his arms. The rat was out of sight before he got the third word out. Eventually, I came up with the idea to tie fishing line to the hook that restrains the spring-loaded door, and the next time she took the bait, I gave the line a sharp tug, and she was trapped.
I took this picture a few minutes later.
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Poor thing was scared, and I was mystified. She looks like an overgrown mouse, not the beady-eyed things that come to mind whenever I think of rats. I worried that the trap's wires might hurt her feet, so I made a crappy box from 1/2" sheathing and hot glue, with a Plexiglass front and a lid that was too small to sit squarely on top. I skewed it a bit so it wouldn't fall in, and somehow managed to get the rat into the box.
Not long after dawn, Jamie came back into the shop with two baby rats he found outside. Instead of leaving them alone, he thought it would be a brilliant idea to pick them up and bring them inside. Damage was done, so I added two baby rats to the box. They were only about a week old, and they obviously belonged to the rat I had captured. Mama rat didn't abandon her concern about her predicament and immediately focus all of her attention on them, but I could easily see the familiarity she had with the babies.
About half an hour later, I looked up from the lathe just in time to see mama rat push the roof aside with her nose. She had actually climbed right up the sheathing and moved the roof enough to escape, and she didn't waste any time. "Screw you two kids, I'm outta here!" Gone.
At that point, the adventure changed from entertainment to responsibility. I hadn't researched anything about rats, and I just assumed that human scent would make her abandon her babies. So I immediately began learning how to take care of newborn rats, and even though they must be tended every 2-4 hours at that age, around the clock, I did a **** fine job. I actually got attached to them. They squeaked, they squirmed, they REALLY enjoyed the feedings, but they didn't make it. Poor things thrived for five days...their eyes were almost ready to open...but something (probably my fault) gave them a respiratory infection, I didn't have a way to help them, and the vet couldn't do anything (because it's illegal to treat wild animals) and I just watched helplessly as they gasped for air they couldn't get. I couldn't even give them a quick death because I was fervently hoping and wishing they would recover. But they suffocated in the open air before dying in my hands. I was both frustrated and depressed.
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When I started noticing things were missing again, I looked in that corner and saw that mama rat had started a new stash. I set the trap, baited it with peanut butter, and caught her again, but she escaped as I was trying to transfer her to a different box. I caught her a third time. Got her in the original sheathing/hot glue box, but the too-small roof fell in, and the surprised rat took the opportunity to escape before the surprised woodworker could make any attempts to prevent it. I caught her a fourth time, she escaped a fourth time. When I caught her for the fifth time with the same bait, (peanut butter = crack for rats), I made a pretty decent rat habitat with solid wood and Plexiglass. I made an "external" room that had a screen floor (fireplace screen, not screen-door screen) for those private moments in every rodent's life (it was the bathroom, haha). The "bathroom" had a hinged ceiling so I could reach into the lower level of the cage to put food and bedding inside, and I put a heavy box of drill bits on top of that ceiling so mama rat wouldn't nose her way out again. The whole setup looked good for a hot glue job, but I was worried that there wasn't enough air flow because I used Plexiglass instead of wire (which I didn't have).
I didn't plan to keep her long, anyway, because it's almost impossible to tame a wild rat if it's caught in its adulthood, but oddly, she was showing a few domestic traits. She would approach the Plexiglass if I put my finger against it, she didn't shy away from my voice like she did throughout the first couple of captures, she was nibbling on the morsels I had put in with her, and then she was drinking water from a dropper I was holding for her through one of the many vents. I went to a hardware store to buy some hardware cloth to improve her air circulation, and stopped by the pet store for some rat treats. I brought the goodies into the shed, and...no rat. The entire bathroom had fallen off. Even if she wasn't in it when it fell, the sound of that box of drill bits hitting the floor probably scared her out of her mind.
I set the trap again, but I put it outside, in a covered area attached to the back of the shed. I caught her for the 6th time less than three minutes after I put the trap down, baited with more peanut butter. I was starting to think she was enjoying the dance. This time, I modified the box with the ill-fitting roof and made a decent habitat out of it. While she was chilling in that home (it was only about 12" x 12" x 12", I started working on a "tower" whose frame was an old waterbed headboard someone threw away. I spent many hours working on it, but she got away in transit from box to tower. For a few days after that, she wouldn't go near anything that smelled like peanut butter. But on day 5, I caught her again after baiting a trap with chocolate pie crust, and she got away again while I was transferring her, surprising me with her leaping prowess and climbing ability (she skittered straight up a wide sheathing board and was out of sight before I could even say, "You suck!"). Three more days passed before I caught her again...with peanut butter...and I successfully installed her in the tower. She completely bypassed all of the little steps and ladders I had put in, navigating by hardware cloth. While she was in the tower, I successfully fed her several kernels of sweet corn by hand, through the wires of the hardware cloth. I went inside the house, and when I came back out to the shop four hours later, she was gone again, having chewed through the sheathing I had used when I ran out of hardware cloth. I slathered an aluminum can with peanut butter and set the trap again, and caught her within the hour. She wasn't even panicking over being caught anymore. She's escaped nine times, but I've caught her ten times. I didn't even use a trap for #10: she hid inside a roll of roofing felt, so I put an aluminum can in each end to cut off another bid for freedom, picked the whole roll up, and held it vertically over the opening in the third cage I made for her until she crawled down into it.
That was two or three weeks ago. She can't get out of my latest cage, even after I added another level on top of it. So now, I have a trapped wild rodent. Killing her isn't an option for me. Dumping her in the woods far away from my house is almost a guaranteed death sentence. But I can't let her continue her mischief in my shop, so now I'm taking care of a wild animal. I had trouble giving her water, because she couldn't see either the dropper or the pipette I used, but I found that adding some fruit juice helped her find the tip by smell. I tried putting water in a clean juice cap, but she immediately spilled everything when she picked it up to "pack" it somewhere. After that, she just crapped in the water-filled lid and kept doing it every time I cleaned and refilled it. I spent two days teaching her how to use the water bottle, but she's a pro now, so I don't have to worry about dropper quenching.
I've made several modifications to the cages. I put an 11" mesh exercise wheel on the upper level, but she's not having any of that nonsense. She probably suspects another trap or similar horrible fate. She eats straight from my hand now, and she's very sweet and gentle about it. Corn is her favorite, but I know I can't give her too much of that. She licks my fingers clean and even puts her front paws on my hand so she can reach further back to search for other tidbits.
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Too much corn makes a ratty fatty.
As completely comfortable as she has grown to being hand fed, she won't let me touch her. I'm disappointed by this; I love petting animals. I make cats and dogs melt in my lap. But the Force is strong in this poor little vermin, and her instincts run way too deep.
Most of the time, she seems content, even happy, but I'm not so deluded that I believe her #1 yearning is for anything other than freedom. So I've resigned myself to a rat's lifetime of obligation, and none of the love.
I named her Rita, after Rita Hayworth, who played indirect roles in The Shawshank Redemption via classic movies and wall posters. Shawshank was about prison, the rat in sort of a prison, so...Rita. That, and since rats can learn their names, I thought it would be an easy one for her to catch.
The fact that her name is an anagram of "I, Rat" is just a bonus.
She stars in my first YouTube video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_QFW1QVWbIc
The next one will be better. I have plenty of footage; she's been a wellspring of weird rodent behavior.
I guess I should be flattered that my efforts have been met with approval from the most discerning aficionados of shiny loot.
Then I found the first pack rat stash while I was straightening up the shop. Everything was just piled in one corner, even the broom bristles and electrical cords. I also found several blue shop towels, a lot of used segments of sandpaper rolls I had used on the lathe and tossed to the floor, packing peanuts, a pack of Jamie's cigarettes that was still halfway full, my new torch lighter that was only three days old when I lost it, several crushed aluminum cans (I recycle), some unused wood pen blanks I had actually ordered online and paid quite a bit for (Gaboon ebony is a frightfully expensive wood!) and one of my Kobalt screwdrivers. Even after finding the mess, I still had no idea how in the world everything had wound up in the corner. A few nights later, my shop guest made her first appearance. I work nights because Louisiana heat is murder when it's married to Louisiana humidity, and I was sitting at the workbench when she appeared two feet away from where I was sitting, smelled me, and scampered off. I had no idea what she was. I had never seen a rat before. I don't recall seeing one even in a pet store. She didn't look like any of the rats I had seen in movies or on TV, so I resumed my work, and thought about rodents.
A couple of nights after she made her debut, I saw her again around midnight, and texted Jamie. He had just gone to bed but decided that mystery rodents were more interesting...and he never has anything important to do, anyway. He brought a squirrel trap with him that looks like it was made before the wheel was invented. He ignored my suggestions to oil it, baited it with peanut butter, and set it a couple of feet from where I found the stash. Less than five minutes later, the rat came out, crawled into the trap without hesitation, and gleefully started grazing on peanut butter, perched right on top of the trip mechanism. I tapped Jamie, who stood up saw what was happening. It took about four seconds for him to realize what was happening, but once the light clicked on, he got mad and hollered something about "Yer not gettin' a free meal ya *******!" as he flailed his arms. The rat was out of sight before he got the third word out. Eventually, I came up with the idea to tie fishing line to the hook that restrains the spring-loaded door, and the next time she took the bait, I gave the line a sharp tug, and she was trapped.
I took this picture a few minutes later.
Poor thing was scared, and I was mystified. She looks like an overgrown mouse, not the beady-eyed things that come to mind whenever I think of rats. I worried that the trap's wires might hurt her feet, so I made a crappy box from 1/2" sheathing and hot glue, with a Plexiglass front and a lid that was too small to sit squarely on top. I skewed it a bit so it wouldn't fall in, and somehow managed to get the rat into the box.
Not long after dawn, Jamie came back into the shop with two baby rats he found outside. Instead of leaving them alone, he thought it would be a brilliant idea to pick them up and bring them inside. Damage was done, so I added two baby rats to the box. They were only about a week old, and they obviously belonged to the rat I had captured. Mama rat didn't abandon her concern about her predicament and immediately focus all of her attention on them, but I could easily see the familiarity she had with the babies.
About half an hour later, I looked up from the lathe just in time to see mama rat push the roof aside with her nose. She had actually climbed right up the sheathing and moved the roof enough to escape, and she didn't waste any time. "Screw you two kids, I'm outta here!" Gone.
At that point, the adventure changed from entertainment to responsibility. I hadn't researched anything about rats, and I just assumed that human scent would make her abandon her babies. So I immediately began learning how to take care of newborn rats, and even though they must be tended every 2-4 hours at that age, around the clock, I did a **** fine job. I actually got attached to them. They squeaked, they squirmed, they REALLY enjoyed the feedings, but they didn't make it. Poor things thrived for five days...their eyes were almost ready to open...but something (probably my fault) gave them a respiratory infection, I didn't have a way to help them, and the vet couldn't do anything (because it's illegal to treat wild animals) and I just watched helplessly as they gasped for air they couldn't get. I couldn't even give them a quick death because I was fervently hoping and wishing they would recover. But they suffocated in the open air before dying in my hands. I was both frustrated and depressed.
When I started noticing things were missing again, I looked in that corner and saw that mama rat had started a new stash. I set the trap, baited it with peanut butter, and caught her again, but she escaped as I was trying to transfer her to a different box. I caught her a third time. Got her in the original sheathing/hot glue box, but the too-small roof fell in, and the surprised rat took the opportunity to escape before the surprised woodworker could make any attempts to prevent it. I caught her a fourth time, she escaped a fourth time. When I caught her for the fifth time with the same bait, (peanut butter = crack for rats), I made a pretty decent rat habitat with solid wood and Plexiglass. I made an "external" room that had a screen floor (fireplace screen, not screen-door screen) for those private moments in every rodent's life (it was the bathroom, haha). The "bathroom" had a hinged ceiling so I could reach into the lower level of the cage to put food and bedding inside, and I put a heavy box of drill bits on top of that ceiling so mama rat wouldn't nose her way out again. The whole setup looked good for a hot glue job, but I was worried that there wasn't enough air flow because I used Plexiglass instead of wire (which I didn't have).
I didn't plan to keep her long, anyway, because it's almost impossible to tame a wild rat if it's caught in its adulthood, but oddly, she was showing a few domestic traits. She would approach the Plexiglass if I put my finger against it, she didn't shy away from my voice like she did throughout the first couple of captures, she was nibbling on the morsels I had put in with her, and then she was drinking water from a dropper I was holding for her through one of the many vents. I went to a hardware store to buy some hardware cloth to improve her air circulation, and stopped by the pet store for some rat treats. I brought the goodies into the shed, and...no rat. The entire bathroom had fallen off. Even if she wasn't in it when it fell, the sound of that box of drill bits hitting the floor probably scared her out of her mind.
I set the trap again, but I put it outside, in a covered area attached to the back of the shed. I caught her for the 6th time less than three minutes after I put the trap down, baited with more peanut butter. I was starting to think she was enjoying the dance. This time, I modified the box with the ill-fitting roof and made a decent habitat out of it. While she was chilling in that home (it was only about 12" x 12" x 12", I started working on a "tower" whose frame was an old waterbed headboard someone threw away. I spent many hours working on it, but she got away in transit from box to tower. For a few days after that, she wouldn't go near anything that smelled like peanut butter. But on day 5, I caught her again after baiting a trap with chocolate pie crust, and she got away again while I was transferring her, surprising me with her leaping prowess and climbing ability (she skittered straight up a wide sheathing board and was out of sight before I could even say, "You suck!"). Three more days passed before I caught her again...with peanut butter...and I successfully installed her in the tower. She completely bypassed all of the little steps and ladders I had put in, navigating by hardware cloth. While she was in the tower, I successfully fed her several kernels of sweet corn by hand, through the wires of the hardware cloth. I went inside the house, and when I came back out to the shop four hours later, she was gone again, having chewed through the sheathing I had used when I ran out of hardware cloth. I slathered an aluminum can with peanut butter and set the trap again, and caught her within the hour. She wasn't even panicking over being caught anymore. She's escaped nine times, but I've caught her ten times. I didn't even use a trap for #10: she hid inside a roll of roofing felt, so I put an aluminum can in each end to cut off another bid for freedom, picked the whole roll up, and held it vertically over the opening in the third cage I made for her until she crawled down into it.
That was two or three weeks ago. She can't get out of my latest cage, even after I added another level on top of it. So now, I have a trapped wild rodent. Killing her isn't an option for me. Dumping her in the woods far away from my house is almost a guaranteed death sentence. But I can't let her continue her mischief in my shop, so now I'm taking care of a wild animal. I had trouble giving her water, because she couldn't see either the dropper or the pipette I used, but I found that adding some fruit juice helped her find the tip by smell. I tried putting water in a clean juice cap, but she immediately spilled everything when she picked it up to "pack" it somewhere. After that, she just crapped in the water-filled lid and kept doing it every time I cleaned and refilled it. I spent two days teaching her how to use the water bottle, but she's a pro now, so I don't have to worry about dropper quenching.
I've made several modifications to the cages. I put an 11" mesh exercise wheel on the upper level, but she's not having any of that nonsense. She probably suspects another trap or similar horrible fate. She eats straight from my hand now, and she's very sweet and gentle about it. Corn is her favorite, but I know I can't give her too much of that. She licks my fingers clean and even puts her front paws on my hand so she can reach further back to search for other tidbits.
Too much corn makes a ratty fatty.
As completely comfortable as she has grown to being hand fed, she won't let me touch her. I'm disappointed by this; I love petting animals. I make cats and dogs melt in my lap. But the Force is strong in this poor little vermin, and her instincts run way too deep.
Most of the time, she seems content, even happy, but I'm not so deluded that I believe her #1 yearning is for anything other than freedom. So I've resigned myself to a rat's lifetime of obligation, and none of the love.
I named her Rita, after Rita Hayworth, who played indirect roles in The Shawshank Redemption via classic movies and wall posters. Shawshank was about prison, the rat in sort of a prison, so...Rita. That, and since rats can learn their names, I thought it would be an easy one for her to catch.
The fact that her name is an anagram of "I, Rat" is just a bonus.
She stars in my first YouTube video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_QFW1QVWbIc
The next one will be better. I have plenty of footage; she's been a wellspring of weird rodent behavior.
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