What rats are afraid of: folk remedies, including odors and the use of insulation, which rodents do not like

Next you will learn:

What are rats and mice really afraid of and how can it be used in practice;
What is useful to know about ultrasonic rodent repellers and what you should pay attention to when choosing them;
In what cases can even the smell of a cat scare away rats for a long time and what is observed in situations where the cat itself is more afraid of rodents than they are of it;
Are rats afraid of light and loud sounds and should you count on this when fighting rodents?
Is it possible to somehow use rats’ own danger signals by recording them once, for example, on a phone;
What insulation materials do not like and are not chewed by rats and mice;
Is it possible to reliably scare away rats using some odorous herb or household chemicals...

The idea of scaring rats out of the house or basement appeals to many. At a minimum, this seems simpler, safer and more humane than fiddling with rat poison or rat traps, then removing caught rodents (and sometimes still alive) from traps.

Meanwhile, many people are skeptical about attempts to scare away rats - some are convinced that these animals are too smart to be afraid of repellents, and some even proudly claim that our “domestic” rats are practically not afraid of anything at all, and means that are confidently used abroad simply do not work in Russia.

In fact, rodents can indeed be quite effectively repelled, and problems in fighting them in practice are often associated either with the fact that people do not know what rats are afraid of, or do not use the appropriate means correctly. For example, many folk remedies do not work at all and do not allow you to get rid of rodents, although myths about the effectiveness of a number of recipes that are simply copied from site to site without any checks are actively circulating on the Internet.

Also, many ultrasonic rat and mouse repellers, especially the cheapest ones, suffer from ineffectiveness or complete uselessness in the fight against rodents (especially the so-called “electromagnetic” and “magnetic resonance” repellers). At the same time, there are quite effective devices on the market that, when used correctly, in many cases really help get rid of rodents in the house.

On a note
Even if you know exactly what smell rats and mice don’t like, this cannot always be used in practice to remove pests from the house. For example, rodents definitely do not like the smell of cat urine and ammonia (ammonia). But if this kind of smell is frantically used to repel pests, then you can bring your own home to such a state that it will be impossible to stay in it. And it is still unknown who will be able to scare off first - rats, or people who decide to come to visit you...

Therefore, it may be advisable to use against rats, first of all, those means and methods that really frighten them, but which are quite normal for humans. By the way, there are not so many such means that “terrify rats.”

What rats are really afraid of and don't like

Perhaps the main problem of repelling rats is that, with rare exceptions, these animals are afraid of the same smells and sounds that are unpleasant to humans. To get rid of rodents without disturbing your comfortable living indoors, you should use means that are familiar to humans or completely invisible, but which rats cannot tolerate.

Among them:

Ultrasonic rodent repellers (high-quality, not Chinese tweeters) - people do not hear ultrasound, but rats perceive it and at a certain frequency and intensity - they are afraid (more precisely, they experience discomfort);
Cats (and to a lesser extent, their smell);
Bright light (provided that the animals are not used to it);
Loud sounds;
Sounds with which rats themselves transmit danger signals to each other.

A common disadvantage of such influences is that rats can get used to them, and the longer a particular sound or smell affects rats, the less they can be afraid of it. This means that when using one or another option, you should always take into account the likelihood of rodents developing individual immunity to deterrents.

Fortunately, addiction in animals does not develop very quickly, and it is often possible to drive them away long before they become immune to one or another influence.

On a note
To effectively fight rodents in a private home, it is also useful to know which insulation is not chewed by rats and mice, since the wrong choice of insulation can create ideal conditions for rodents to live in the walls of the house and in the attic. We’ll talk about this in more detail below, but for now we’ll just note that, contrary to popular belief, glass wool in most cases is not able to scare away rats - rodents can easily make their moves in it.

How to get rid of a rat in an apartment?

If you find a rodent in your apartment, start by cleaning. No matter how trivial it may sound, most likely the pest appeared due to the fact that you have unsanitary conditions.

Do not clutter your room, do not leave dishes in the sink for a long time, and put all food in the refrigerator, since you can only get rid of these animals by organizing in perfect order.

Rodents enter apartments through garbage chutes or sewers. In rare cases, a rat can enter an apartment through the toilet. Find all the holes and loopholes in the wall - if you notice the slightest crack, repair it immediately. Most likely, by following these simple tips, you will rid your apartment of such unwanted guests as rodents.

Which methods are suitable for an apartment? Using poisons in an apartment building is scary. If you just call specialists from the sanitary and epidemiological station or any commercial organization, they will scatter poison in the basement. You can use electronic repellers in the apartment itself.

Ultrasound and methods of its application

Rats and mice hear sound with a frequency of up to 80-100 kHz, while humans are no longer practically unable to perceive vibrations with a frequency above 20 kHz. Sound with a frequency above 20 kHz is called ultrasound, and it meets one of the requirements for rodent repellents - to affect rats and mice without affecting humans.

It has been verified that devices that emit sound waves with frequencies from 20 kHz to 70 kHz can indeed repel rats quite effectively. In this case, an effective repeller must not only generate ultrasound, but also have a number of other important characteristics.

Here are the most significant of them:

High sound pressure (a parameter similar to volume, but in the ultrasonic range). The higher the sound pressure, the higher the likelihood that rats will not tolerate the sounds produced by the device and will leave the area;
The wide directional pattern of emitted ultrasound determines in which direction and how widely the sound travels. Ideally, it should approach 360°, that is, in fact, ultrasound in this case will spread evenly around the entire repeller. Most devices claim this angle, but in fact their ultrasonic radiation pattern barely reaches 50°;
Automatically changing ultrasonic frequency. It is important to understand that not all ultrasound scares rats. Just as not every sound causes discomfort in humans, not every ultrasound repels rodents. But if the device constantly changes the frequency of the emitted ultrasound, then periodic discomfort will not be avoided for rodents.

The most effective ultrasonic repellers against rats today include Biostrazh, Chiston 2, Chiston 2 PRO, Tornado 800, TM-315 and some others. They are also one of the most expensive. More affordable devices are not as powerful, and some of the cheapest ones are outright junk, useless and not at all capable of scaring rats.

In addition, rats can get used to ultrasound, just like any other sounds. This, although rare, does happen. In this situation, pests may leave the room at first when the device is turned on, but then they will return again.

It is also useful to read: Glue for catching rats and mice, as well as important nuances of using sticky traps

Ultrasonic repellers, when used correctly, do not have a negative effect on people, but may cause headaches for some. It should also be taken into account that cats and dogs hear ultrasound well, especially domestic mice, rats and hamsters, and therefore if there are pets in the house, such a device may not be able to be used.

At the same time, a cat itself, and sometimes a dog, is often a much more effective “repellent” of rats and mice...

Lethal rodent traps

To kill rats, you can make a mixture of flour and alabaster in a 1:1 ratio. The composition must be laid out next to the holes and containers with water placed nearby. Having eaten the product and washed it down with water, the rodent is doomed to death, since the water will dissolve the gypsum that has entered the rodent’s body. It is important to understand that this method is not the most humane and will doom the animal to a painful death.
Don't forget about spring mousetraps. Moreover, they have been replaced by new generation spring traps. Unlike mice, rats have a larger body weight and larger dimensions, so a classic mousetrap is not always able to contain such a pest.
To exterminate rats, a device such as an electric trap . It is a small house that needs to be turned towards the rodent’s home and wait. The moment a rat falls into the trap, it is struck by a discharge of current, which ensures instant death. The trap is equipped with a special indicator, which will save you from the need to constantly check its contents and notify you of the capture of the intruder.
If you decide to kill a rodent yourself after catching it at home, you can use the following method. Place the rat in a regular plastic container. Dissolve baking soda and vinegar in a cup. Their reaction will release carbon dioxide and suffocate the rodent.

Cats and their smell in the house

Everything is simple here: cats are the natural enemies of rats and mice, and therefore rodents avoid places where there are fresh traces of cat activity. Even if a cat does not hunt pests in the house (which often happens with pampered pets), rats are afraid of their smell, which reduces the likelihood of rodents, but does not guarantee their complete absence.

It should be noted that although we are talking about the smell of a cat, this does not mean that all the walls and furniture in the apartment should be thoroughly saturated with the pungent aroma of cat urine. Rats have a keener sense of smell than humans, and they are afraid to enter rooms with a cat, where a person may not feel any odors at all. And if the owners of the house forget to change the litter in the tray from time to time, the corresponding aroma will literally “hit the rats’ nose”, and they will prefer not to run into the room again.

If a cat does not catch rats, they can get used to its smell over time and calmly tolerate such proximity. In this case, rats usually simply live in the same house as the cat, but avoid direct encounters. Particularly impudent rodents can demonstratively go about their business in full view of the cat, and sometimes even attack it.

Here, by the way, a lot depends both on the character of the rat itself and on the experience of the cat. It happens that cats are afraid of rats because they have never met them in their lives and do not know how (and most importantly, why) to catch these neighbors in their housing. Pets who grew up in apartments and have never obtained natural prey behave this way especially often. Even experienced, but lazy and always well-fed cats do not hunt rodents simply out of laziness, and if rats behave particularly impudently, they may even be afraid of them. It is in such cases that various comical situations arise when a rat can scare cats or even drive them away from food.

Normally, cats are not afraid of rats, and if you do not overfeed them, they actively hunt them for fun and fresh meat. In rural areas, cats are specially fed only from time to time so that they switch to pasture and feed on pests in the house and garden.

From all of the above, we can conclude: rats are afraid of cats when they hunt them. The cat itself and its smell can scare off pests at first, but once the rats understand that the cat poses no danger to them, it’s just a matter of time before the rodents move into the house.

On a note
Generally speaking, rats are afraid of people, dogs and any other large animals (including birds - turkeys, geese, guinea fowl and chickens) that they see for the first time. If animals meet people somewhere over and over again and get used to the fact that they are not hunted, then they stop being afraid and often become very arrogant. There are known cases when rats stole food from the table right in front of people, or from a dog’s bowl - from under the nose of the dog himself.

It is also interesting that mice are afraid of rats, since rats, as larger predators, pose an immediate danger to them. However, this fact is not useful in practice in the fight against rodents.

Pest prevention

Dealing with a rat infestation is a difficult task that requires an investment of money and nerves. Isn't it easier to prevent proximity to parasites? Remember that rats and clutter are two closely related things, so follow simple rules and pay due attention to cleanliness.

Adhering to useful recommendations and “getting acquainted” with rodents does not promise you:

regularly clean the area near your house; the presence of freely accessible garbage is an invitation to rats;
Monitor the condition of the garden and trees. The presence of garden waste attracts rodents, and later they will want to move into the house;
carefully inspect the house for cracks, holes, and other openings that could become a way for a rodent to enter the room. Use a fine metal mesh and seal all existing ventilation ducts with it;
Pay special attention to water sources in the house and near it. Rats need water daily; its absence will scare away uninvited guests. Fix leaking pipes in the house, close the toilet lid at night;
Do not leave pet food bowls out overnight;
Store all food supplies in tightly closed containers, do not leave crumbs on the table, and do a thorough cleaning of the house at least once a month.

Simple rules will help protect your home from rodents, even other parasites that can significantly ruin your life.

Rats are dangerous parasites that require constant control; if several individuals are not exterminated in time, you will have to deal with a huge infestation of pests in the house. If necessary, involve your neighbors in the fight against rats; this issue is especially relevant if rodents are found in a multi-story building.

Find out more effective ways to control rats in the following video:

Light

Rats are nocturnal animals, and other things being equal, they prefer to be in dark places and go out in search of food at dusk and in the dark. However, they easily and quickly adapt to light, and if they do not encounter any dangers in illuminated places and in bright rooms, they quickly cease to be afraid of light. Often, rats become diurnal and forage in daylight.

This means that although in general rats are afraid of light, it will not be possible to use this as a permanent repellent. If you leave the light on in the room, then after a few days the animals will stop paying attention to it.

On a note
Interestingly, due to the specific nature of their vision, rats do not perceive infrared light. In zoos, this is used to switch nocturnal rodents to daytime mode: during the day a red light is on in the enclosure, and the animals believe that they are in the dark, and at night a regular incandescent lamp is turned on, and the rodents go to sleep. As a result, visitors during the day can observe animals that lead a nocturnal lifestyle.

Loud sounds

This factor is very specific: rats are really afraid of loud sounds, but it is inconvenient to use them in a living room. As an exception - loud music, in which pests will not dare to get out of their hiding places, but it is impossible to listen to it around the clock, and at night, in silence, the animals will calmly rule in the kitchen or basement.

On the other hand, rats are afraid of noise only until it becomes familiar to them. And they get used to different sounds quite quickly, especially if you try to scare rats often and regularly. Therefore, to scare away rodents, it is irrational to use ordinary sounds audible to humans.

On a note
Like most wild animals, rats, even indoors, are also afraid of quiet sounds - various rustles and creaks. This is understandable: in the wild, a predator always creeps up on its prey quietly, trying to make a minimum of sounds, and therefore the quiet crack of a broken twig under its paw or the rustling of leaves foreshadows great dangers for the rat.

At the same time, at large industrial enterprises - grain warehouses, transshipment depots, ports - rats calmly collect grain under trucks with running engines, run under rumbling conveyors with vegetables and nuts, and do not pay attention to noisy presses at oil extraction plants. They know that these particular noises do not pose any danger to them.

Rat "screams of terror"

Like some other animals, rats can be repelled by playing their own danger signals. This method is sometimes used to scare away birds and to control monkeys on tropical farms. Once a recorded cry of danger is enough to use it almost constantly and effectively.

It is also useful to read: How to poison rats and mice to quickly get rid of their presence in the house

However, some rules must be followed:

The sound should not be played regularly so that the animals do not get used to it;
The sound should be clearly audible throughout the room;
The actual cries of danger must be recorded, and not just squeaks;
Recording and reproducing equipment must capture the ultrasonic frequency range.

In domestic conditions, the implementation of this method will in most cases be ineffective. Firstly, using a smartphone or computer microphone to record rat squeals is not the best option, since the ultrasonic component will not be recorded at all (even vibrations above 15-17 kHz will be recorded with distortion). Secondly, reproduction will also require emitters (speakers) capable of reproducing ultrasonic vibrations without significant distortion. Well, and thirdly, few people would want to live in a house where a loud rat squeal is constantly suddenly heard.

The use of ultrasonic rat and mouse repellers in this regard would be more justified.

On a note
People know the harsh old-fashioned way of scaring away rats: they used to simply catch a live rat and nail it to the wall. While the animal was dying, its relatives heard the terrible screams of its agonizing fellow. However, for humane reasons, such a method should in no case be considered for practical implementation.

Reviews

After destruction, it is important to find and dispose of all corpses

Sergey:

“There were rats in the warehouse, they didn’t let us live - they were arrogant, noisy, they gnawed everything they found. We tried more gentle means - they didn’t help, we threw away a couple of carcasses and that’s it. When we were looking for something to scare away rats, we found excellent reviews for the “Ratcatcher” and decided to try it: we mixed minced meat with gel, and to be safe, we also dripped it into the water. After the weekend, they immediately found about 15-20 corpses, in the corners - a dozen more, it’s good that they didn’t start to stink. Now we got a couple of cats, the rats haven’t returned yet.”

Daria:

“I used “Rat Death” when in the spring I discovered traces of the presence of rats at the dacha. The result is amazing: a week later, about 5 corpses were found outside the house, the rest seemed to have evaporated. Just in case, I installed an ultrasonic repeller. I haven’t seen a single rodent all summer, even the mole holes have disappeared.”

You can get rid of rats in your home using different methods: prepare a dangerous mixture, buy poison or a repeller, or set traps. But getting rid of pests does not end with elimination: it is important to properly dispose of the corpses. Dead rodents must be moved and burned or buried at a depth of at least 0.5 meters.

What insulation materials do not like and are not chewed by rats and mice?

There are several types of insulation that are a fairly reliable barrier to rats and mice in private homes. It would not be entirely correct to say that pests do not like them or are afraid of them - rather, they simply cannot gnaw through such materials, and if they can, they usually do not do it.

Among them:

Foam glass is insulation that rats do not chew due to its hardness;
Expanded clay of different fractions - for the same reasons. Although, the smallest expanded clay used for dry screed is not always a reliable barrier for rats and mice - although they do not like such insulation, they are able to rake and make their way through its layer to the floor covering;
Foam concrete - it lends itself to rat teeth, but due to the presence of cement in the composition, animals do not like it and do not gnaw it;
Ecowool is an insulation material that, due to the toxicity of the impregnation components (boric acid), is unattractive to rats and mice.

But rats are not afraid of the notorious glass wool. Even more than that, they willingly make nests and shelters in it, easily make passages here, and the crushed glass in the material does not seem to bother them at all. Other mineral insulation materials are similar to glass wool, including those made from basalt fiber, as well as polystyrene foam, polyurethane foam and penoizol - animals willingly live in them and raise their offspring.

Herbs used to repel rats

A big temptation for many people is the idea that you can take some kind of herb against mice and rats, which supposedly just needs to be laid out in different places in the room to forget about these pests once and for all.

Among folk remedies for rodents, it is recipes with certain herbs that can be found most often. Thus, it is believed that mice and rats are afraid of:

Mint, fresh or dried;
Beans (especially roasted seeds);
Blackroot - any parts of the plant;
Elderberry, mostly bunches of its berries;
Hot pepper, both in pods and ground;
Chamomile flowers;
Tansy - its inflorescences, maybe in bunches with grass;
Wormwood is also mostly a dry herb.

However, the main drawback of the herbs recommended to repel rats and mice is that the animals very quickly get used to their smell, or, in the case of poisonous plants, stop gnawing the grass. Even if one or two animals are poisoned by the same blackroot, the rest of their relatives will not leave the room, but will simply avoid the suspicious bait.

Chamomile

Another pest-repellent plant is the beloved chamomile. Its healing and repellent properties have been known to people since ancient times. Long-tailed animals left the hut, on the floor of which fragrant chamomile inflorescences were scattered. Bunches of dried inflorescences helped preserve food stored in outbuildings.

A decoction of the plant was also used to protect the house from gnawing mammals. To prepare it you need 3 tbsp. l. fresh or dry raw materials, pour 1 liter of water and boil for 10 minutes. The resulting decoction was used to treat kitchen furniture, as well as the favorite places of parasites.

Folk remedies whose repellent abilities are questionable

Folk art is replete with ideas and recipes for remedies that rats should supposedly avoid, but in practice this often does not happen.

Here are just the most famous of them:

Vinegar - It is believed that rats are afraid of it due to its strong, unpleasant odor. Some even try to use vinegar essence, which is unsafe to use, for this purpose. At the same time, however, it is silent that not only rodents, but also the residents of the premises will have to inhale the aroma of vinegar;
Essential oils and perfumes. It is highly doubtful that the animals that have conquered the whole world from India to the USA would shy away from the exquisite aromas of world-famous perfume houses or the smells of essential oils. Such means can alert them, but are not able to drive them out of the house;
Bleach - Rats actually avoid places that smell too strongly of bleach (bleach releases small amounts of chlorine gas into the air, a very caustic, poisonous gas). However, the active use of bleach in an apartment or house is a dubious idea, since the residents themselves will have to inhale such an aroma. In addition, the duration of action of the product is short, since bleach quickly loses its activity in the air;
Naphthalene - rats are not always afraid of it, and, moreover, this same product is recognized as a carcinogen and is prohibited for use in residential premises;
Ash. The use of ash to repel rats is a typical folk myth, since it does not cause any fear or particular discomfort in rodents;
Broken glass falling asleep in rodent passages is also a kind of unfounded legend;
The smell of burnt rubber and burnt fur - such folk remedies may indeed frighten rats once, but they are not capable of becoming a reliable permanent means of fighting them;
Turpentine, kerosene and gasoline - the same applies to them as to vinegar. And in addition, they are also fire hazardous;
Burdock thorns, which supposedly frighten animals by clinging to their fur. Actually ineffective;
Tobacco or cigarettes - despite their strong smell, they practically do not repel rodents.

On a note
In general, rats are not afraid of water (moisture) and cold. They feel great in damp basements, can swim for a long time (in nature they are known to catch ducklings and frogs in the water), and can easily tolerate the cold if they have access to food sources. Situations have been described in which rats lived for several generations in freezers at an air temperature of -18°C, breeding inside frozen pork carcasses. Therefore, airing a house or apartment in winter will not help get rid of rats.