to kill or not to kill? that is the question.

[Diana]

Does anyone have any suggestions on what I should do about the rats in my compost bin? I didn't mind a few of them at first, but they have multiplied to the point that I'm concerned about the neighbors reporting me for breeding rats! So I quit taking out new compost for the time being. Here I was thinking I was doing something positive but didn't intend to start a rat colony! I can't let my cats in the backyard because of the neighbor's Rottweilers. And I can't let my own dogs into the garden area because they'd tear it up. I tried talking to the rats but all I got was a wide grin thanking me for feeding them. I really don't want to have to ask my husband to take apart the compost bin and attach a bottom and top to it. (The rats are burrowing underneath so just putting a top on it won't help.) I really dislike wasting good veggie scraps and am anxious to start composting again. But I can't knowingly feed a rat population inside city limits!

Help!

I had mice (I think they were pack rats) in the garage. I keep bins of horse food and bird seed there for the animals. We started finding little piles of horse pellets everywhere, but that was just the tip of the iceberg. One day we opened the hood of my car and there were little piles of horse pellets tucked into the depressions running down the top of the motor. It was absolutely funny (though my partner, Fred, wasn't as amused as I was). The coup de gras was when Fred moved some equipment under his work table and behind was a pile of stuff five feet wide! It was hilarious: there were pens, screws, fibers from rugs and blankets, tree branches, little rivets, and even a pair of reading glasses! It still tickles my insides when I think about that massive hoarding.

We just used a no-kill cage with peanut butter, and transported the rats to another area with a water supply (go out of the city). Occasionally, after the first relocation I would open the hood of my car and find pellets and little rivets and screws tucked into the engine. It took 3 or 4 times over a period of perhaps a year. We haven't had any in the garage that I know of since. We do have a resident lizard there however, Shorty (because when he first showed up his tail had come off).

I don't know what kind of compost bin you have, but I used to have one that stands on legs with a handle to turn the contents and I think it was all enclosed. You could get a new one and start using that, and let the old one just die out.