Nancy - Posted - 11/19/2009:  04:25:35

Well, there's one in the shed at the ranch. My daughter thinks it is cute. Me? I don't think rats are cute.

She found it's nest, and also in his nest, her router bits, and the thing had unpacked a coffee can of nails, and all manner of other things. She took back her router bits, and the thing didn't run, but simply watched her. She felt bad taking his treasures, so cut up an apple for it. She says maybe trapping it and moving it to a new location next spring.

I donno. Trapping now seems better, since after reading up on them...they stink.

xnavyguy - Posted - 11/19/2009:  04:56:04

Looks a lot like the one I see in the mirror every morning.

AD3AD3AD3 - Posted - 11/19/2009:  05:08:24

I don't think I'd want it hanging around, either. But, clearly, your daughter is a good hearted soul.

banjobilly32 - Posted - 11/19/2009:  05:14:13

Looks more like a deer mouse to me. Those big ears & bulging eyes.

FisherPicker - Posted - 11/19/2009:  05:20:56

Would she like a few more??? I'll send her some!

Nancy - Posted - 11/19/2009:  05:24:30

[quote]Originally posted by FisherPicker

Would she like a few more??? I'll send her some!



That's a kind offer, but I believe she has all she needs.

FisherPicker - Posted - 11/19/2009:  05:37:04

We had a "small problem" where I used to live....There were so many you could watch them run along the fence tops at night.........I got out the ole benjamin pump and and was going to have a time of it when my wife saw one up close.............."He's so cute and fat, and bug eyed! and big earred! Do we have to kill 'em? He looks like Jerry." ( Tom and Jerry..cartoon for all ye younguns) Well, after 20 some odd years of marriage you tend to do things....so I trapped them and moved them to the river side..............it took me a dang near a month to get the numbers down.....yup couldn't let any of my friends know what I was doing......I would have never heard the end of it.

MTBanjo - Posted - 11/19/2009:  05:41:11

I was a fire lookout for a summer a couple years ago, and a wood rat lived in my woodpile. He had all kinds of stuff stuffed into there. I really didn't like him...he'd go scampering around the catwalk at night and stole a hot pepper plant I left out on the catwalk by mistake when I went down to town one weekend. I hope it burned!

bluemule_77 - Posted - 11/19/2009:  05:54:34

Many, many, many times, on ranches where I've lived all over NM and west TX. The other trouble with living in packrat-den country is that they are the primary host of the "blood-sucking conenose" -- or kissing bug, or genus Triatoma. These little beasts are evil! If they get into your home, they hide out on the tops of vigas (roof beams) or any other place "out-of-sight" and wait 'til you are asleep to walk up beside you (not on you -- that might wake you!) and repeatedly insert their needlenose in your arms, face, lips, eyelids... whatever is soft and at-hand.

I'd moved into an old 19th-century one-room dugout that had only been used for storage for the last 80 years, and though I did my best to seal it up against critters, I was plagued by the conenoses. The advice I got to combat them was destroy only the neareast packrat nests so that the conenoses would be drawn to others nearby but somewhat more distant from home-sweet-home.

Here's one of the buggers:



BM

dingo - Posted - 11/19/2009:  06:00:24

I thought you where talking about my husband!!!!!!!

He is cute in the picture, but I grew up around the Haunta sicknesses, if there is anything that resembles a mouse or rat like creature around it is dead. People think I am over reacting, but I lost 11 good friends in the manner of 3 days. All from the furry little creatures.

black flag - Posted - 11/19/2009:  06:28:12

They're MUCH bigger than any Deer Mouse--the body can be the size of a softball

They're cute in a limited sort of way, but they're destructive and have NO redeeming qualities--I (live)trap them every chance I get and drive them way down the road. I caught one yesterday that had made its nest in the water pump enclosure under our house, using the fiberglass insulation for nesting material.

They're also especially partial to nibbling on the insulation of electrical wiring and are a significant fire hazard--a few years ago we had a nice old Dodge Power Wagon gutted by fire and totaled because some miserable Pack Rat had made itself a nest inside the dashboard.

Chris

BConk - Posted - 11/19/2009:  06:45:40

They also serve as hosts to the fleas that carry bubonic plague - at least in such areas of the country in which plague is endemic.

pandjlocke - Posted - 11/19/2009:  07:31:09

The only rodents I see around here are the ones left out on the porch as "presents" by my two cats. Sometimes there's only a half a rodent.

bluemule_77 - Posted - 11/19/2009:  07:32:07

Forgot to mention that, yep, they are destructive to vehicles. I spent a lot of time and frustration rewiring my pickup that they'd destroyed.

BM

Bisbonian - Posted - 11/19/2009:  08:47:53

I had 'em bad in southern Arizona. bluemule, one of them actually ate through the battery cable to my truck! A set of them completely filled the shed that housed my well pump with weeds and other debris. Full, top to bottom; a giant nest. But to answer the question, have I seen one? Yes. I moved a cabinet on the back porch that had some suspicious debris sticking out from under it, and a mother pack rat ran off around the corner of the house, with two babies clinging to her belly. I was amazed she could run like that.

We have the more typical Norway rats, here, and fought for a couple months to get one out of the house. Finally cornered it under the top of the stove (keeping warm, I guess, though it had started to collect a few goodies there), caught it in a live trap, and took it down to the river. Your secret is safe with me, FisherPicker.

Kenneth Logsdon - Posted - 11/19/2009:  09:01:57

Yept, we have the eastern packrat in this area and in the cave.. used to show one at the Frozen Niagra entrance to the public... probably millions of pictures, it was there for years, had an interesting collections of money, flash cubes, shinny wrappers and etc..

Frailinaway - Posted - 11/19/2009:  09:42:57

A few words in defense of packrats: it is surprising to find so many banjo players disliking packrats or woodrats. With their bulgy little eyes, large ears, nice whiskers, sharp noses and poochy little tummies, these guys could fit into many banjo jams on physical appearance alone.
While it is true that their large nests serve as a habitat for the Triatoma or kissing bugs, cowboys and other adventurers camping near such locations often collect many interesting stories about the wild west that can be related to grandchildren in future years (provided they don't contract Chaga's disease from the bugs.......rare in the U.S.)
Packrats (Neotoma sp) harbor the fleas which can transmit plague, usually the bubonic form, to humans. The rodents also contract this disease and die. An area here in west Texas and New Mexico with large numbers of inactive packrat nests is often indicative of an outbreak of sylvatic plague. Empty nests should serve as a warning sign to residents and visitors in the area; the rats may be dead but their fleas aren't and they will actively seek new blood donors.
Among the zoonoses (diseases common to or transmitted between other animals and humans), rabies is among the most justifiably feared. On the positive side, packrats do not transmit this often fatal disease to humans although they are subject to infection themselves. (The common method of transmission -- passage of infectious saliva via a bite -- normally kills the packrat.)
Lastly, regardless of how cute and interesting they may be, do I want to share my property and personal possessions with them, their little cone-nosed buddies or any other assorted disease carriers? Not on your life!

Brian T - Posted - 11/19/2009:  09:55:52

There was one in the wood shed at the ranch. At one point, I thought the little guy had more stuff than there was wood in there. Most glamorous decoration was a empty plastic-wrap box. The shed got cleaned out, the rat was trapped, so far nobody else has moved back in.

Mopick - Posted - 11/19/2009:  10:36:32

What about Hantavirus? Or is that only deer mice that carries hantavirus?

Edited by - Mopick on 11/19/2009 10:37:20

black flag - Posted - 11/19/2009:  11:21:20

In defense of the wretched little creatures, there is one interesting thing about them. Through analysis of core samples of packrat middens, paleo-botanists are able to gather very accurate data about the flora of a given area over hundreds, even thousands of years.
http://sbsc.wr.usgs.gov/cprs/resear.../middens.asp

Edited by - black flag on 11/19/2009 20:40:41

Nancy - Posted - 11/19/2009:  15:25:18

The daughter just told me on the phone that they are going to borrow a live trap and catch the critter and deploy it to another area.

Somebody told her it ate truck wiring. Not good. It's going to be relocated cause she does not want that.

dbaty - Posted - 11/19/2009:  18:30:34

I'll take snakes anytime over bugs.

dingo - Posted - 11/20/2009:  07:18:40

Mopick, yes, but they all just about look alike.