Our next door neighbour has the onset of dementia and she’s always fed the birds in her garden. Just lately, she must be getting through a sack of seed every week. She has 2 bird tables that she fills, 5 flower pots on her rear patio, she fills them. She also scatters some seed on her patio table. She has a large bush on her side of the fence, some of which encroaches onto our side but that’s not the problem. In this bush she has a hanging bird table plus a couple of feeders. Tonight, I thought I saw a squirrel in the bush but looking closer, it was a bloody rat! I ran out and banged the fence and the bloody thing ran along the fence like a squirrel and disappeared over the back. Mrs Mottie was screaming! Twenty minutes later, I saw it come across our garage roof and go down a clematis plant on the other side of our garden. I put my sliders on and ran out to stamp on the *******. Again, Mrs Mottie was screaming - this time at me! "Don't hurt it, don't hurt it" she said. Of course, it legged it across the garden, ran up the fence panel and dropped into next doors garden. Mrs Mottie then had a go at me saying there must be something wrong with a man that would hurt an animal, even a rat! We had a problem a year or so ago when they chewed their way into our shed to get at the bird food I had there so I just blocked the holes and got rid of the feed. Where there’s one, there’s more though. So, what do I do? Set traps - humane ones - and release them elsewhere like I did with the mice I caught when we had a problem? Have a word with the neighbour which would be difficult bearing in mind her condition? Get environmental health round? I can’t put poison down in case birds, squirrels, hedgehogs, cats etc eat it. Any ideas?
