Ferrets

Stonehall9

Well lads, was looking for a bit of info on ferrets, my father(rip) used to keep them years ago and my mother said we never had a rat at home as long as we had them, lately I've noticed an increase in the f**kers at home in the stone walls, not helped by a lad who has stables close by so they have feeding, but last night I saw one in the dog pens and shed this mornin so I'm just wondering would a good working ferret be of any benefit to me, I was going to buy one in birr for the young fella but herself said no, but today she is all for one😊 any info would be great thanks

MrTom1

Instead of getting a ferret find someone who has them and ask them to give you the shavings or bedding when they are cleaned out. If you spread that around the house the rats will avoid you place like the plague

Stonehall9

MrTom1 wrote: »

Instead of getting a ferret find someone who has them and ask them to give you the shavings or bedding when they are cleaned out. If you spread that around the house the rats will avoid you place like the plague

Thanks Tom, sounds like a plan at the same time I wouldn't mind having one at home for m y young lad, i take it so rats do not like anything ferrret related so? I have a lot of dry stone walls and I'd be interested in trying to work one in them if possible

Wizard!

Ferrets are hard to keep and train, although they are lovely once you do.
A couple of Jack Russells will be equally effective and better pets for your young lad.
That goes for 1-2 rats and you must act fast. Once they create a den, you need professional help.

Stonehall9

Wizard! wrote: »

Ferrets are hard to keep and train, although they are lovely once you do.
A couple of Jack Russells will be equally effective and better pets for your young lad.
That goes for 1-2 rats and you must act fast. Once they create a den, you need professional help.

I have four gundogs already!!!! Not a hope of getting a terrier , she would go mental ha .I'd like to try get a working ferret if I could, like I can always just poison the rats but just wondering really how the ferrets work on them to be honest. Kind of ares I live in we will always have rats show in up close to winter time, they love stone walls aparently

dodderangler

Wizard! wrote: »

Once they create a den, you need professional help.

Not only that but you'd need a good strong buck to take on a mother rat that's protecting her young. Even cats would be weary of taking on a protective mother. I had a lovely small doe that was great at bolting rabbits and never killed a rabbit but she was torn to shreds by a big female that was protecting her young. Killed my doe.
Sent in a buck I named Spartacus and he killed the rat but was left with some war wounds.

Stonehall9

dodderangler wrote: »

Not only that but you'd need a good strong buck to take on a mother rat that's protecting her young. Even cats would be weary of taking on a protective mother. I had a lovely small doe that was great at bolting rabbits and never killed a rabbit but she was torn to shreds by a big female that was protecting her young. Killed my doe.
Sent in a buck I named Spartacus and he killed the rat but was left with some war wounds.

I've heard story's of rats winning fights with terriers and I always thought that they were myths!! So what your saying is the rats don't always flee? Would the ferret have no fear of rats in general or is it a good working breed you need to take them on?

retro d

Air rifle is the other way if you don't go the ferret route , put a little bit of peanut butter half a spoon smeared use a twig on the lower part of the wall where there is a good backstop for a week or two get em use to feeding on it, keep an eye on it everyday ,and don't put peanut butter back in the kitchen for someone else to eat it afterwards , I use night vision spotter for spotting them there eyes shine up like diamonds cant miss them and red filter lamp on top of the Air Rifle , then there getting a 760 fps 177 cal 8.4 grain pellet into the noggin , I have done it in a few places lots of late hours and lot of patience , if your not too far away il gladly give you a hand , they are sexually mature at 5 wks , can have five or six litters in a year with 7 to 14 in a litter 7 is common , so one pair can give birth to 40 in a year , to think that 2 rats can become over 100 in a year, do the maths its a very scary world after dark

Stonehall9

retro d wrote: »

Air rifle is the other way if you don't go the ferret route , put a little bit of peanut butter half a spoon smeared use a twig on the lower part of the wall where there is a good backstop for a week or two get em use to feeding on it, keep an eye on it everyday ,and don't put peanut butter back in the kitchen for someone else to eat it afterwards , I use night vision spotter for spotting them there eyes shine up like diamonds cant miss them and red filter lamp on top of the Air Rifle , then there getting a 760 fps 177 cal 8.4 grain pellet into the noggin , I have done it in a few places lots of late hours and lot of patience , if your not too far away il gladly give you a hand , they are sexually mature at 5 wks , can have five or six litters in a year with 7 to 14 in a litter 7 is common , so one pair can give birth to 40 in a year , to think that 2 rats can become over 100 in a year, do the maths its a very scary world after dark

Ya I've seen them first hand at our pheasant pen last year the had tunnels everywhere we were catching 3 and 4 a day, I've a cage down since yesterday and had the lamp on them last night but saw nothing and cage trap was empty this mornin! I shot one in the bottom of the lawn Saturday with the shotgun and haven't seen them since monday which is a bit odd, I haven't got a ferret yet but if they are there now as the weather becomes colde r I'd imagine I will see a lot more of them,

Eddie B

Not all ferrets will hunt rats! Also, a large ferret wont get into too many rat burrows, so there's alot of factors involved!

If you do get a ferret, you'd be better off getting two! They need alot of handling, and alot of maintenance to keep them clean, healthy, and less stinky! Much more work than keeping dogs!

One thing i would say, ferrets ain't easy to keep, or an ideal pet for a kid for that matter, especially if your other half ain't keen on smelly furry things!:D

dodderangler

^^^^ not just that but when a ferret bites he feckin hangs on

Stonehall9

Eddie B wrote: »

Not all ferrets will hunt rats! Also, a large ferret wont get into too many rat burrows, so there's alot of factors involved!

If you do get a ferret, you'd be better off getting two! They need alot of handling, and alot of maintenance to keep them clean, healthy, and less stinky! Much more work than keeping dogs!

One thing i would say, ferrets ain't easy to keep, or an ideal pet for a kid for that matter, especially if your other half ain't keen on smelly furry things!:D

Thanks lad, this is the kind of info I was lookin for really, as I said I was very small last time we had them, but if they are hard keep aswell as dogs then mabey they aren't an option, I have my hands full as it is, had a rat in the cage yesterday when I went home so I just shot him and set cage again, nothing this morning but an old lad near me at home told me a "good one" that's if it's true!! But he reckons to throw spent cartridges into the holes in the wall that rats hate the smell of gun powder??? Anyone ever heard of this??

MrTom1

Why dont you use the cannibal rat !!!!!!!!!!!!

Set a load of traps out , catch a few , stick them in a big plastic bin or container and leave them for a few days until they all start getting hungry, in the end there should be one big fat rat that will for them on out will eat and kill every rat around :cool:

cannibal rat will destroy

Stonehall9

MrTom1 wrote: »

Why dont you use the cannibal rat !!!!!!!!!!!!

Set a load of traps out , catch a few , stick them in a big plastic bin or container and leave them for a few days until they all start getting hungry, in the end there should be one big fat rat that will for them on out will eat and kill every rat around :cool:

cannibal rat will destroy

Is that not just another myth? ? I should actually try it for the craic! !!

MrTom1

no it works, really scary **** but it works

riffmongous

MrTom1 wrote: »

Why dont you use the cannibal rat !!!!!!!!!!!!

Set a load of traps out , catch a few , stick them in a big plastic bin or container and leave them for a few days until they all start getting hungry, in the end there should be one big fat rat that will for them on out will eat and kill every rat around :cool:

cannibal rat will destroy

Sounds needlessly cruel to be honest, rats or not

Eddie B

riffmongous wrote: »

Sounds nfeedlessly cruel to be honest, rats or not

Yea old solutions like this are both outdated and illegal in todays world! Stay away from anything that brings animal welfare issues into question! Nothings worth ending up in court or jail for that matter!

retro d

Cannibal rat i have heard it all now , i think your reading too many comic books
, as much as i like to control rats as a pest they deserve a quick death no suffering whatsoever

idnkph

Cannibal rat or not, it's instinct is to reproduce so wont solve your problem doing that. When he gets a sniff of a female he won't want to eat. He will just want to ride

MrTom1

Lads not going to get into this , if you dont believe me or your to busy googling it to find out if this real then its not for you. Its the best soultions to a bad rat problem.

Ive seen it done and works , you will not have a rat around . Thats all i have to say so :cool:

dodderangler

But you've t catch the rats first and then put them into a barrel with a starving one for him to kill them?
Why not just kill the ones you catch?

Eddie B

MrTom1 wrote: »

Lads not going to get into this , if you dont believe me or your to busy googling it to find out if this real then its not for you. Its the best soultions to a bad rat problem.

Ive seen it done and works , you will not have a rat around . Thats all i have to say so :cool:

What if a cat or something catches that rat, you'd have to start all over again!lol

Kevhog1988

dodderangler wrote: »

But you've t catch the rats first and then put them into a barrel with a starving one for him to kill them?
Why not just kill the ones you catch?

It does the killing for you. Once it gets the taste of blood it becomes blood thirsty. Have never done it myself but my father has told me all about it.

MrTom1

theemigrant wrote: »

It does the killing for you. Once it gets the taste of blood it becomes blood thirsty. Have never done it myself but my father has told me all about it.

exactly once it gets the taste of rats blood it will kill every rat in the area

dodderangler

theemigrant wrote: »

It does the killing for you. Once it gets the taste of blood it becomes blood thirsty. Have never done it myself but my father has told me all about it.

But then your left with a highly aggressive rat then. And once it's food source is gone it will move elsewhere towards a house maybe.

Stonehall9

I haven't caught one since and my brother is mad to try the canibal rat method, I'd like to see it myself but I reckon I'd kill the canibal before I'd let him go! !

MrTom1

dodderangler wrote: »

But then your left with a highly aggressive rat then. And once it's food source is gone it will move elsewhere towards a house maybe.

its a rat its not a 1200lb cannibal hog , when it kills all the rats around it fecks off , if it doesnt catch it and kill it. Its not like its going to come into the house and murder the family :rolleyes:

Seriously

Thedeerstalker

So much nonsense....Do people still believe in cannibal rats and rats that kill terriers...Come on lads!

Cannibal rats are a myth, someone always knows someone who did it

Someone said ferrets are hard to keep and "Train"....Ive never trained a ferret, and they definitely aren't hard to keep - They take time like everything else with handling, cleaning, feeding and maintenance...But definitely not hard.

If I were you Id get to setting a few cage traps and Fenn Mk4's...They will do the trick nicely over time, or alternatively just get a hold of some lad with an airgun, bait the rats with a bit of seed and get him up for a few evenings shooting.

MrTom1

Thedeerstalker wrote: »

So much nonsense....Do people still believe in cannibal rats and rats that kill terriers...Come on lads!

Cannibal rats are a myth, someone always knows someone who did it

.

Its actually not ive seen it first hand :cool: it works