The Rat Diaries (the conclusion)

Jul 122011
 

read part I here

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Don’t worry, that rat is not real… It’s the only rat that seems to be left these days though. I have to admit I thought our “rat trap off” would be a much longer process. It looks like our unwanted fury friends are not hang­ing out in our yard any­more. Hur­ray! Time to call our “wanted friends” to come over and sip San­gria with us under the pergola…

Final results: $2 spring back mouse­trap verses the $40 elec­tronic Vic­tor rat trap

$2 spring back mouse­trap caught a total of 8 rats

$40 elec­tronic Vic­tor Rat trap caught a total of 5 rats

If you con­clude the win­ner is the one who caught the most then the spring back mouse­trap won catch­ing a total of 8 rats in 8 nights. The elec­tronic Vic­tor trap caught a total of 5 rats in 8 nights.

How­ever there is a big dif­fer­ence in how each device works. My con­clu­sion is the elec­tronic Vic­tor trap won because of it’s ease of use while being effec­tive.  Let’s be real here, most woman (maybe some men too) don’t want to see or touch the dead rat. The $2 spring back trap is pretty archaic. You have to hope not to snap your­self while set­ting. Worse than that though is dis­pos­ing of the dead rat. Where the $40 elec­tronic Vic­tor trap is very easy to set. (just add bat­ter­ies and peanut but­ter) Once you have a dead rat, your con­tact visu­ally or phys­i­cally when dis­pos­ing of it is extremely minimal.

Funny Story:
“Laugh­ter is an instant vaca­tion.” Mil­ton Berle

So you see the rat/mouse in the above photo? Well, I bought it to play a joke on my hus­band. I care­fully placed it par­tially stick­ing out from under his dresser next to the bed. It looked so real! I know, that sounds so mean huh? It turns out when he dis­cov­ered it when I wasnt’ home. (Rats!!) I made him con­fess if he fell for it or not. He said he thought it was real enough look­ing that he got a wire hanger and poked at it. (I’m laugh­ing so hard just typ­ing this!) I guess no girl­ish screams came from him, but pok­ing it with a hanger is sat­is­fy­ing enough for me. I’ll take it!! “gig­gle, giggle!”

 

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The Rat Diaries

Jul 022011
 

Part I

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

This is a tale of two rats…or should I say more like twelve rats! If you read my blog reg­u­larly, you know were fix­ing up the back­yard. What good is a cool place to hang out if you have unwanted com­pany? No, I’m not talk­ing about Roy... haha Imag­ine sit­ting under our per­gola eat­ing Mahi Mahi fish tacos when sud­denly one of our guests lets out a “screeeeech”! Not because the tacos were so mind blow­ing either. (although they are) It’s because of the unwanted guest that just brushed up against their feet. Not good, not good at all…hence the begin­ning of my “rat diaries”.

 

 

 

 

 

 

After shop­ping the pest con­trol aisle at Home Depot, we were more con­fused on which method to use to erad­i­cate our prob­lem. We decided to have our own “rat trap off”. We bought two sys­tems. First, the good old fash­ion $2 spring loaded mouse­trap that was invented in 1894. Sec­ondly, we bought the $40 elec­tronic Vic­tor Rat trap. This sys­tem deliv­ers humane, high-voltage shocks to kill the rat or mouse in sec­onds. We are using peanut but­ter as the bait on both traps.

Impor­tant Tip:

For the first few nights we put the peanut but­ter on the traps with­out set­ting them. This way the crit­ters feel safe com­ing and snack­ing. I know it’s so mean, huh? I feel bad just typ­ing this. But obvi­ously not bad enough because we pro­ceeded to set the traps on the third night.

Drum roll please…

First night with traps set:

3 rats were caught on the $2 spring loaded mousetraps

1 rat caught in the $40 elec­tronic rat trap

Warn­ing:

Graphic result pho­tos here. May not be appro­pri­ate for chil­dren or peo­ple who are squea­mish. View at your own risk.

 

FINAL RESULTS HERE


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