Rats, bloody rats.

I might have mentioned rats once or twice before,  we usually find evidence of them trying to nest in boxes or wood piles, the Christmas tree box had been nibbled at sometime over the last year,  sometimes we find an abandoned nest in a box but over the years we have protected most things.  The shed has wire mesh over the air vents,  shelving has now become cupboards, and the wood is stored further away from the house as we don't want them too close.  I don't think we'll ever be rat-free, after all we live in the country,  other friends have lots of cats to deal with them but 2 dogs is enough for us.  Our neighbours have 2 cats which we see around here so maybe they help keep the population under control.

But they do nest, or find nesting material,  in the most inconvenient places.  Last Wednesday I went into Cadiar in the 4x4 as we had empty gas bottles to replace and the car hadn't been used since December 28th!!   A month is longer than normal not to use it so it needed to go out.  All was fine down to Yator,  but driving into Cadiar which is gradually uphill, the car was very sluggish, wouldn't accelerate, 2nd gear just juddered but finally got there very slowly in 3rd.  Rang John, said I don't think it'll get home as that's even steeper so when I'm finished in town I'll take it straight to the mechanic.  He came in the other car - thank heavens we've got 2, as I had  bought 4 gas bottles and a sack of potatoes ,  and we left it for Luis to look at.  It was overdue a service but only in time not in mileage - or kilometres -  we've only done just under 5000 in the last 2 years.

Luis rang Tuesday evening to say the car was ready so we went to collect it yesterday.  And the problem had been the air filter,  but it wasn't blocked with dirt or dust, but had been eaten away by rats, the chewed up middle had been rolled into a ball and then sucked into the air inlet when I went out!!!  He'd kept the air filter to show John,  it had gnaw marks from the rats teeth in the plastic.  So what to do?  It only takes a few days for them to set up house somewhere and we can't go out every day.  And we can't protect the car with wire mesh either!  The bottom of the washing machine now has a wire mesh base as they ate through the water inlet tube a few  years ago (the machine lives outside under cover)   and a mouse got into the kitchen once and nibbled the insulation around the oven, the foil lining from that dropped down onto the electric contacts that work the light and spark and shorted it out so that is now wire meshed around the hole.  

What or where will they try next?