Two Silos Farm

Today started out pretty much as usual. Did the normal "get ready for work" routine, which gets topped off by sliding on mud boots and heading to the chicken coop. The coop is in the old granary, which is divided in two sections. Chicks are in one, large birds in the other. There is a door between, and the trap door to the outside is right next to it.

So I go into the chick side (they are in a partition so I'm not walking in their pen).
Open the door to the main coop to open the trap door, and see a small grey/brown snout poking out from the rat hole chewed in the corner of the laminate we have on the walls. There is a hole in the floor in that corner also, and I knew there was no where for this rodent to go unless he came out of the wall.

I looked at him, he looked at me . . . And I didn't have anything with me to get him!! Of course there isn't a whole lot that I'd want to be firing off in that small of an area; I was about 6' away.

So I did some quick thinking, and grabbed the cement block that was on top of another hole in the floor, and put it in the corner. Just as I was setting it in place, the rodent ran out the hole on the one side of the wall, into the hole on the adjacent wall. Guess he decided he didn't have time to try to get into the hole in the floor. Hubby put a license plate over it, and the end got pushed up. Had he went for the hole in the floor, the cement block would have made it there before he did (that would have been ok too . . .)

So, figuring I had the escape route blocked off, I headed back to the house.

Son had worked that night, got home around 4:30 am and he was playing computer games when I got up. So I hollered up the stairs
"Are you still up"
"yea" he replies
"Grab the pellet gun, I got a rat trapped in the chicken coop"

He was down the stairs in no time flat, got the gun and some extra pellets and he headed out with determination in his stride.

He took a stance in the coop, and I removed the block. Figured in a bit, the rodent would poke his head out again. I went to take care of the chicks, and turned around and sure enough, there was that grey snout and beady eye looking at me again. From the angle, I don't think he could see my son. Son saw him though . . . POP!! and the snout disappeared.

We listened to it scrabble around in the wall cavity a bit (there is insulation there too) and then it got quite. Son banged on the wall a bit, and no noise.

I was late for work, so we decided that this afternoon we'll remove the screws from the bottom half of the laminate and retrieve the carcass. It smells enough in the coop without that!

So now Son can add "rat" to his list of kills.

Afternoon update:

Got the rat out of the wall, was bigger than I thought. That is my foot (size 8.5) in the picture.

This picture shows the two holes in the wall (looks like one hole, but there is an opening on each side of the corner). The rat had just enough of his nose poking out the smaller side for son to get him right in the head.

And here is the patch job. The rodents can only get into the walls if they first come up from the floor.

I tossed the rat way out back; hope something (other than my dog) will drag it off. After that I worked on the chicken fence some more. Got the rest of the old fence removed, the posts pulled (love my puller) and set them out where the new fence will go. Decided I didn’t feel up to pounding posts tonight, so I’ll leave that for tomorrow evening.