Hens and rats

[Richard]

Does keeping chickens on a tractor or an ark on raised beds reduce the possible trouble with any rats. Has anyone had rats trying to chew through the raised beds?

My new beds will be lined underneath with wire to prevent burrowing and food will be stored in metal bins away from the ark. Are there any other suggestions that would be useful.

I know rats are all around us but I don't want to give the neighbours reason to be upset and complain.

[Fred's Fine Fowl]

Rodents inhabit any area which provides for their needs

bedding

feed

water

shelter

Keeping your area well organized and cleared of clutter is a great start.
Metal storage bins for feed, (not plastic) are another great step you've already taken.
I don't think they would move "into" your nicely finished, tight jointed, raised garden bed with a chicken tractor on top, but could certainly be encouraged to move into the area.

Think of what a wonderful resource a compost pile is to rodents? Food and shelter in one spot! Not to mention the heat which is generated deep in the pile. Mice can get into and through amazingly tiny places. Rats are more obvious.

My chickens hunt and kill mice and I've never had rats. A neighbor, maybe a 1/4 mile away, has frequently had problems with rats setting up house beneath his coop and garden sheds. They subsist on spilled feed from his bird feeders and so on. He had always wondered why I raised my buildings? Now, all too late, he knows the answer.

Ounce of prevention as they say....

I would never use poison as a rodent control method, though there are plenty of schematics demonstrating how to place bait inside pvc pipe and so on. That poisoned mouse, rat or other varmint, once poisoned, is bound to be eaten by something else... and the toxic cycle continues

[Richard]

Thanks for the info.

The ark I want to purchase has the nesting area about 18 inches over the run. Is that a sufficient enough height or is higher better?

[gardengirl72]

When my husband got sick last winter I had a friend take care of my livestock and low and behold a Rat family moved in to my garden.

It freaked me out. My friend, neglected alll of the classic safe guards, and as Fred said when feed was spilled about and compost was available for shelter it was an easy no brainer for the norway rats to make a home there.

Once they were established it became a holy war between me and them. After trying traps and all sorts of things I was forced to "bait and switch" them and I poisoned the whole clan in a about a week.

My cat Pete, the mascot for this message board, is very good at taking down the young ones and the mice, but the larger "alpha" males were too smart and powerful and only poison worked, and only with a "bait and switch".

So, after five or six years of rodent free living, I had one month where they attacked my little farm. They have not returned though. So if they come, aggressively attack them and you will be fine.

The Rat is EVERYWHERE!