are wild mice/rats attracted to domestic ones?

[Petunia]

The apt that I am looking at is on the first floor and has steam heat - the old coiled radiators, and of course that means many holes in the floors where the pipes come up,
in fact there seemed to be an unusual number of holes and pipes coming up for other things as well

it's an old building and it's had multiple renovations made to it, I guess that's probably why all the pipes and holes that are exposed like that

I am concerned about moving there because not only am I thinking it would be so easy for one of my girls to get out one of those holes,
I am worried that having them there would attract wild rodents to my apt.

is that something that could happen?

I've lived on the 3rd floor for so long, I forgot all about some of the hazards of living on the ground floor- like, er, being closer to the ground LOL

 

[Petunia]

I think it's really too big a risk-

I emailed the landlord and told him I can't take the apt

 

[jorats]

Male wild rats would definitely be interested in your females.

 

[crumbilina]

You could spray foam insulate around those tubes in the holes. I had a problem with mice in my old apt and we went around and put spray foam around any incoming pipes or any holes in the walls. Didnt see any more signs of mice (or other critters for that matter).

Many people say that they can chew through the foam tho. I am not sure about if this actually happens, so I can't say... but it did work for me.

Now every apt that I move into I make sure to sprayfoam around pipes right away

 

[victoria]

You could spray foam insulate around those tubes in the holes. I had a problem with mice in my old apt and we went around and put spray foam around any incoming pipes or any holes in the walls. Didnt see any more signs of mice (or other critters for that matter).

Many people say that they can chew through the foam tho. I am not sure about if this actually happens, so I can't say... but it did work for me.

Now every apt that I move into I make sure to sprayfoam around pipes right away

Mice can chew through the foam if they are determined enough, but mice are prey to rats so may avoid the house. Male rats being attracted to female rats is a different story though.

 

[Petunia]

Male wild rats would definitely be interested in your females.

:laugh4:

yeh that would cause a lot of trouble, eh? can't get my six girls spayed and I really really do not want babies of any kind, let alone half wild ones, so........


there were some other issues with the apt I noticed when I went back there with my sister- things were a lot older and dirtier than I had remembered and the rooms were smaller


They say that first impressions are lasting ones and that is SO true- the first thing I saw in this apt was the brand new ultra modern kitchen cabinets and lots of counter space- that sucked me right in LOL


oh well. I am managing for now. I do have to move at some point because of the stairs here and my bad knees, but it is so expensive to move and so much work that I have to be sure that I get a place I can stay at for a long long long time!!

 

[MomRat]

David and I work maintenance crew on the buildings we live in(owned by the school he attends). Our buildings run the gamut from 70 years old to almost 115 years old! Everyone has the steam heat radiators, and they have holes around them in the floor whether you live on first or third floor. =) Spray foam is really annoying to landlords, and maintenance people, in my experience. There are things that work better that make less of a mess; filling mouse holes is not its intended purpose. Steel wool packed into mouse holes prevents chewing(think chewing on tinfoil for a mousie) and then you can putty or caulk over it to blend it in. We have blocked a lot in our apt, but we still occasionally get mice; our rats are all couch trained so we don't worry too much about them finding a hole and disappearing. =)

 

[Petunia]

We have blocked a lot in our apt, but we still occasionally get mice; our rats are all couch trained so we don't worry too much about them finding a hole and disappearing. =)

see, my girls are used to having an entire room to run around in and now they will try (and at least two of them have succeeded) jumping off of tables etc. (don't have a couch or sofa)

so I can picture them taking off the first chance they got :shock:

there were other issues with this place as well, the washer and dryer had to go in the basement and the whole reason for moving was the stairs, I have bad knees and stairs are just making them worse

with six rats and my own sewing I do a LOT of laundry so having to go down stairs to do it, would be too hard and painful. just thinking about it makes my knees hurt lol