A damp tale of bad mice....

[Andrew Bodenham]

Following on from the recent thread about the merits of different microbore heating pipes, an unfortunate tale.

A friend who has recently installed a new CH system in a cottage renovation arrived home to find a steady drip-drip-drip through the kitchen ceiling. It didn't take him long to find a section of plastic pipe upstairs with the tell-tale tooth marks.

Fortunately it was a heating pipe, and so released a limited supply of water. If it had been one of the water pipes at mains pressure things could have been a lot wetter!

Now he's thinking about replacing the whole lot with copper.

Anybody else had rodent damage to plastic pipework?

 

[Nemesis]

Protection against rodents

When used in locations that are vulnerable to rodent attack, all plastic pipes and fittings should be adequately protected within sealed ducts.

Speedfit products, along with other materials such as electrical cables may be damaged if rodents are present. If vermin infestation is suspected then a rodent exterminator should take appropriate action.

http://www.johnguest.com/linkpages/SPFinstADV.html



I have found rodents will gnaw at anything pretty much.

 

[Gervase]

I've seen 15mm copper pipe that rats have gnawed through. To be honest, rats and squirrels will destroy just about anything if it takes their fancy. Mice, on the other hand, may be deterred by copper.
Our place used to be overrun with rodents, but since moving the cats in I've not seen a single sign of one in the house. The chicken run is another matter entirely, however :evil:

 

[Penners]

Over the years I've seen rodent damage to a wide variety of things, but thankfully so far no problems with electric cables or plastic plumbing (fingers crossed behind my back).

Perhaps the most extreme event was years ago, when a neighbour found that a rat had gnawed through a tin of cat food, to get to the stuff inside.

It's surprising enough that he could penetrate a metal can, but how did he know it contained food? Can super-rats read?

 

[Nemesis]

The front teeth of rats grow continuously and to keep the teeth to a useful length the rat needs to gnaw on hard objects all the time; objects can include lead water pipes, brickwork, electric cables, wood and anything else available.

http://www.stedmundsbury.gov.uk/sebc/live/pestvermin.cfm

 

[chuckey]

I have had a rat chew through the insulation on an electric cable that ran under my kitchen floor.
The rats gain entry to my underfloor void via missing bricks under floor (AKA air brick) and they gain access to my attached neighbours property via some sort of hole in his brickwork under his decking.
The problem is:- how do I get my neighbour to lift his decking and fix his hole?
Or, to fix the missing bricks in the party wall, means I have to lift part of my dining room floor (carpet tiles on hardboard on nailed floor boards). Then take down a spacer (?) wall that carries the joist bearers (propping up the floor joists). Then mortar in one air brick, rebuild wall, realign joist bearer, replace floor boards, replace hardboard, replace carpet tiles. Repeat for other end of dining room, repeat for front room, again two places. Thats why I have been putting the job of!!!
Frank

 

[Flyfisher]

Our place used to be overrun with rodents, but since moving the cats in I've not seen a single sign of one in the house.

I think I'm going to have to invest in a similar solution.

We seem to have spates of mice in the kitchen, with a trap catching one everyday for a while (usually about 7 days) then nothing for a while. Presumably this is when the resident family has been wiped out and there's a gap before another one moves in.

We had a bar of soap half-eaten once, so they clearly don't bother too much about the taste.

 

[Moo]

May I recommend a couple of lurchers?

 

[Flyfisher]

Lurchers? :shock:
What size/speed of mice do you suffer from?

 

[Moo]

Just the usual sort. Lurchers can't get up to full speed indoors.

 

[Flyfisher]

Thank goodness for that

 

[Penners]

Just the usual sort. Lurchers can't get up to full speed indoors.

You never met our lurcher, Poppy. She could achieve sufficient speed from a standing indoor start to take her straight through a plate glass French window.

She also used to chase helicopters for miles, charging straight through hedges, barbed wire fences or any other obstacle.

She wasn't a bright dog.

 

[Moo]

She wasn't a bright dog.

Nor were ours. More Santa's Little Helper than Lassie, I'm afraid.