Re the recent posts on mouse bait. For a while now I've been hearing scuffling noises in the walls and attic of our house, convinced it was rats because any mice we've had in the past have been tiny, and these noises are loud (or so it seems at two in the morning!). So I stuck a peanut-butter-baited breakneck rat-trap (Rentokil Advanced) up in the attic and within the hour I'd got...either a large mouse or a small rat. It's mid-brown, got a body about 4" long and a faintly hairy tail about the same length, so I'm guessing it's a mouse, because rats have hairless tails. But could it be a juvenile rat?
Has it got a white chest and sand brown fur? If so Wood Mouse or possibly Yellow Necked Mouse. House mouse 7.5 - 10cm. so you must have caught papa:-) Otherwise look back to thread on Glis Glis (edible dormice) greyish with white underside and fluffy tail.
Norwegian rats are grey rather than brown but 4" is big for anything else.
Maybe I've killed a rare mouse-rat hybrid and robbed the scientific world of a major new discovery which would have life-enhancing benefits to mankind.
OTOH, maybe I've killed the first in a line of a potential new species that would rise up and enslave the human race.
History will judge me. Either I will go down as the most evil man ever to walk the planet (after Simon Cowell), or I will have statues erected in my honour.
For years we suffered each Autumn from Woodmice storing and eating Walnuts in our loft. Neighbours from hell is nothing compared to something balancing a nut on a joist and slowly gnawing through the shell at 11pm!
Trapping was effective but never 100%. Better near the entry point.
The cure was twofold: take down the Walnut tree and extend the house. The extension closed off the open cavity wall where the garage butted up to a timber barn.
History may award you a vote of thanks from relieved taxpayers for reducing the potential burden on the National Health Service:-)
Honestly sounds just like a small/young rat, rats definitely have hairs on their tails, thick-ish hairs and spread out a bit, so could well fit your description of a faintly hairy tail, from a distance they may look to have a pink-ish hairless tail, but up close you'll notice the hairs, and if you run your hand down a rats tail you will feel them,
they are to help them climbing things, as they wrap their tails around the item being climbed, and the hairs pointing downwards act like a one way devise, allowing them to climb but helping stop them sliding down.
and rat's have a tail very close to the same length as their body,
someone mentioned the norwegian rat, i assume they mean rattus norvegicus aka the brown rat, this is the standard model rat that lives in the wild over here, and is the ones pet rats are based on, but they are actually from china, they were called the norway rat as they came to england on ships from there,
they vary in colour in the wild but are usually a brownish colour (agouti is the name for it, brown at the base, but the hairs change colour towards the tip, can be a white or a black tip, or another shade of the base colour)
He/she is prolly a youngster, so you may have more about somewhere, tho you wouldent have had mice whilst they were around, so that's one thing :)
Have caught 4 mice (under the floor) in the last 2 weeks with the `doesnt kill` traps and let them go a couple of miles down the road. Still think I have one as the peanut butter disappeared and no mouse in trap. Mmmm tiling the floor now so hell knows what to do. Also saw a rat emerge from under the shed and then discovered a hole which looks like a rat hole. Put the hose in it and after 10 minutes still wasnt overflowing so hell knows where it goes to, I hope not under the house, anyhow bought some rat poison and tipped it down the hole, so hopefully.......
I dont suspect any in the loft but think I will stick a couple of traps up there just in case.
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