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RATS ARE EATING MY PODS

N

nickk

ever since my neighbours over the back fence went and made a chicken pen next to my fence where i keep my greenhouse i have had a constant battle with rats/mice.i went out and looked at my cayenne plants and found some of my pods are being munched on by rats/mice since there is nothing else growing this time of year in terms of fruit/veg in my yard. they go for the red ones and just eat the flesh and leave all seeds and pith behind. next to these plants i have a bunch of nuclear strains like bhut jolokia,t-scorp,naga morich etc. that dont have pods yet. i dont know wether these rats like spicy food or if they can even feel heat from chilli but this will be an experiment to see if they like the flesh from these super hot pods!! ive got a jack russel that catches alot of mice but i think the main problem is the rats so im gonna get :h a few pet friendly traps today! :cool:
 
Ha Nickk

I have also had that problem! they do like the hot ones as well, not sure if the heat affects them ( like no sweat glands) or maybe there just mouse chili heads.

I know they can devastate a plant in no time at all! I left on plant on the garden shelf for nest years seed, went out in the spring and it looked like judgment day, every pepper was eaten, but they wouldn't eat the seeds. and those where Fatalii, Good luck with the traps.

one thing that I found is that mice have a very sensitive smell and do not like moth balls, I threw a few of those at the bottom of every plant, the munching stopped! just a thought

Cheers Spicy Chicken
 
hah i like all the ideas you guys came up with. the moth ball trick sound good as long as my dog dont like them,and dont know how well he would like a cat prowling round his yard.my dog is a bossy one that is very teritorial. im gonna trim all bottom growth on my green house plants because all the munching seems to be on the pods closest to the ground. and ill put some traps around the stems. ive already got some mint in one of my other patches ill transplant some in each corner of the gh in pots as mint spreads rapidly in my super fertile black soil.
happy growing!!
 
nickk said:
hah i like all the ideas you guys came up with. the moth ball trick sound good as long as my dog dont like them,and dont know how well he would like a cat prowling round his yard.my dog is a bossy one that is very teritorial. im gonna trim all bottom growth on my green house plants because all the munching seems to be on the pods closest to the ground. and ill put some traps around the stems. ive already got some mint in one of my other patches ill transplant some in each corner of the gh in pots as mint spreads rapidly in my super fertile black soil.
happy growing!!
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You wouldn't happen to be using bone and/or blood meal, would you? That stuff tends to attract the beasties....
 
nah i dont feed any of that blood & bone stuff to my plants as ive heard about that before.but before my neighbors built a chicken pen i never saw 1 rat. now i spot atleast 2 big fat ones each week running along the top of the fence to and from the chicken pen. i put a basic mouse trap with peanut butter on top the fence with sticky tape but ended up killing a bird,which i did not want to happen :( so from now on if im gonna use traps outdoors it has to be friendly for the other wildlife. im just googling DIY mouse trap boxes now. might make a few and see how it goes
 
I use a live trap, and it works great. The old mouse/rat traps just don't catch anything for me. A little peanut butter at the end of a live trap works very well. I once caught a squirrel and let it go. If it makes you feel better, you can transplant them...or not.
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Tell your neighbours that you will torch the chicken coup unless they give you all the chicken poop (nicely aged of coarse). :hell:
 
Are you sure it's rats? I mean, rats are mammals too, and I thought all mammals have the receptors to be sensitive to capsaicin... and I can't imagine any animal besides us humans being crazy enough to enjoy the heat and become chili heads. If it really is a rat problem, I don't know whether I should think they're cool (hey, they're little furry chili heads!) or little bastards (you know, for getting to your hot peppers before you do) or both...
 
You know, you might be onto something here. I'll bet it also adds a real nice flavor to them ta' boot! I didn't say what to do AFTER you shoot 'em. DEEEEEELISH! :sick:
 
I tricked my cat into eating some hab dust on a piece of meat, she sneezed for ever and kept shaking her head . kinda mean but funny no harm done.
 
Spicy Chicken said:
I tricked my cat into eating some hab dust on a piece of meat, she sneezed for ever and kept shaking her head . kinda mean but funny no harm done.
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My mom's old dog used to eat anything--and I mean anything--it had the chance to (but what dog doesn't?). That included bits of ground beef for tacos that has been treated with a nice, healthy dose of habaneros and other very hot C. chinense varieties. She'd lick it up in no time, she seemed to really like it, and then she'd lick her lips repeatedly for the next five minutes (clearly, it's the burning...). LOL. If any beef for my tacos/enchiladas/taco salad fell, she'd never fail to clean it up.

I've never forced (or allowed) my cats to eat or lick any peppers (IMO that would just be wrong, even though it'd be funny), but I sometimes cut fresh peppers in half and have the cats sniff them. They seem to like the smell, because they lick their lips a couple times after smelling. I have them smell some of my beer too, and they seem to have good taste in beer. They lick their lips after smelling a good quality brown ale, porter or stout, but don't care to smell cheap mass-produced adjunct-ridden pale lagers.
 
I had a garden in Acton that was full of Kangaroo rats and mice.

We used to put 5 gal. buckets in a hole in the ground with a few inches of water in them.

The mice would fall in trying to get to the water and drown.
We had to empty the buckets every morning.

Some were so full of mice that a bunch of live ones would be on top of a raft of dead ones that were dead and floating.
Killed literally thousands of mice but still ended up giving up trying to grow anything.
Too many mice eating up the plants.
 
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