Hi Mike,
Go with the mothballs, cedar chips, electronic repellers, cat
balls--whatever it takes. D-con is supposed to attract the critters. Its
active ingredient is warfarin, the blood anticoagulant that is used for
the same purpose in heart-attack and stroke survivors. Bought as an
ethical drug, the stuff is expensive. Bought at the feed & grain store,
it's almost free. Perhaps the difference in price has something to do
with the accuracy of the dose? So the way it works is that the rodent
blood gets so thin that the critter hemmorhages internally. That's why
you find them at the watering hole. That it takes a couple of weeks to
do the deed serves at least two purposes. 1) if the domestic animals get
into the stuff, it's not likely that they will get into it enough times
to do them serious harm, and 2) the critters try to get to water, so they
don't die in your house, or cylinder, and 3) apparently rats are smart
enough so that they appoint scouts to test samples of feast-appearing
gifts, suspicious that they might be too good to be true. Since warfarin
takes a couple of weeks to work, the rats don't see the tester croak,
thus assume that the gift is healthful..
Bob
who once kept the TD in a barn, used D-con, mothballs, camphor balls,
mouse traps and numerous barn cats
On Sun, 28 Dec 1997 03:10:44 -0800 Mike Lishego <mikesl@tartan.sapc.edu>
writes:
>Hello,
> I'm getting ready to install the new carpeting into my 'B, but
>it will sit in
>a garage with a rodent problem. My father and I have been putting out
>a fresh tray of
>D-Con since I've been home with no real success. As an odd aside, my
>neighbor has
>fished 38 dead rodents of all kinds out of his pond in the past few
>weeks...Anyway,
>the little suckers have eaten my old seats apart and I found two dead
>mice trapped in
>the cylinder bores of a headless engine. What can I put in my car to
>keep them from
>nesting in my wiring or eating my new carpet? It's obvious that the
>D-Con is
>pointless, since more animals come into the garage to take their dead
>comrades place.
> What about mothballs? Cedar? Electronic pest repellers?
> Thanks in advance, however, cats are out of the question...8-(
>
>--
>Michael S. Lishego
>St. Andrews Presbyterian College
>Elementary Education Major,
>English Minor, Class of 1999
>R.A. of Winston-Salem Hall
>
>
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