Rat in toilet!!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I wouldn't get a cat as a remedy. Unless you want rat guts spread all over the floor.... I'm so sorry you are dealing with this OP!!

I totally get your point, but I'd rather rat guts instead of living rats.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:where in arlington?

Come on. You know it's south arlington

Actually north Arlington. But near the R-B corridor.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I hate stinking rats. I saw a live one outside once while i was living in another state. It was as big as a cat, aggressive, and seemed arrogant by the way it was prancing around unafraid of people.

I live in a brand new an apart. now in the 9th floor, can the climb that high? Is there a way to make sure out vents have screens? Either way, I think I will not sit on the toilet at night with the lights off ever again.

Sadly, rats can indeed make their way into high-rise toilets. As noted earlier, they can hold their breath for a really long time. It's actually amazing how they've adapted to be able to thrive.

[Anonymous]

yes, rats are amazing. They can swim up vertical pipes and scale vertical walls. We had one in our home's walls that escaped from a third floor toilet and then would scale the inside of the walls of our house's nightly (we'd hear it in the basement and then in the attic 3 floors up). I have no idea how it did it. It was a nightmare to trap.

[Anonymous]

Happened to us and two other families we know in NW.

[Anonymous]

Horrible situation. So sorry to hear about this. Scary! Early Halloween.

[Anonymous]

omg - I didn't want to know this

[Anonymous]

Put a toddler lock on the toilet lid, it can't get out, right?

[Anonymous]

So sorry op. I thought of the this American life that someone else posted. It's horrifying but also hilarious. Yuck. Rats, houses, ugh, yuck, awful, blech. A pox on that rat.

[Anonymous]

I am so sorry. Sorry you have to deal with this and sorry I read this thread!



I will never sleep again. The stuff of nightmares.

[Anonymous]

I really really regret reading this thread.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Op here. The saga continues. It did not go down the toilet as I had thought but into the house as I found a hole in the bathroom this morning where it had chewed. Pest control came yesterday and left traps in the basement but obviously didn't get it. It chewed up our new bathroom but more concerned with it being in the home. Pest control is coming back today to set more traps. Ugh. Any words of encouragement appreciated.

Well. I read this entire thread last night. Most out loud to my husband as we are renovating a rowhouse now. I'm also sending this link to our contractor.

OP, I seriously have no idea what to tell you, I feel awful for you. I do have to say, 7 pages of this thread and it is ALL supportive, which was actually heart-warming because DCUM is a cold evil place most days. Something about this terror has united all of us, and that's actually nice to see instead of snark and nastiness.

My friend lives a block from us. Thought he had mice for years, as his dog would go mousin in the middle of the night. Turns out it was rats. He woke up to one eating the dog food the other day. It's horrible. He is beside himself over it. That said, if you have any sort of food you leave out, put it away. Water too.

To an earlier poster - yes, oddly rats can swim. Who knew, right? I was as shocked to hear that as I was that some squirrels can fly. W.T.F.

OP, the pest control people will guide you on this but you have to eradicate the rats. They tend to not leave a very small area that they call home, so there's not really a great chance that the rat moves on to a new abode. He's probably been in your general vicinity for his entire life. Catch him now before he dies in the walls. And this time, you have to catch him. No slamming the toilet shut and running off, though, as one poster wisely said early on - no amount of freaking out is overkill here.

OP, I am wishing you well. We had rats invade our house in upper NW last spring. We had a neighbor doing renovation on her basement and we suspect that it disrupted a colony. Lucky us. It happened suddenly and with a virulence that I cannot overstate. We had at least one rat come up through the basement toilet. We discovered the rats one night after our dog went crazy in a back bedroom on the second floor of our semi-detached house. The rat was successfully creating a cavern behind the radiator and into the wall. At first we thought that we only had the one rat. Boy, were we wrong. We had a pest guy come that morning and he confirmed that the infestation was severe. After the first night in which our dog "discovered" the rat, the infestation became increasingly and distressingly obvious. You could hear the animals in the very early morning hours coursing through the entire house (all floors) in the walls and on pipes. I won't go into all the details, but I will say, that if you have a rat chewing a hole in your bathroom, you have big problems. Please, please, please stay on top of this problem. Monitor your pantry and kitchen closely because they are smart and can get into almost anything. Stay on top of your pest control company. Keep us updated. I am so sorry that this is happening to you and wish you all the best as you work to eradicate these pests from your home.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Happened to us and two other families we know in NW.

It happened to us too. Horrible...worst nightmare of my life.

[Anonymous]

They are ridiculously smart. We had one who would eat only gala apples from our fruit bowl. It was so gross seeing those little tteeth marks.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This only happens in DC because of the antiquated sewer system and it crosses storm drains

We live in Bethesda. It happened to us. And on the second floor of our home!! The rat was huge, and fortunately, dead. I flushed it immediately. In retrospect, I should have taken a picture of it. DH and the kids still think I was having a nightmare. But this was before I had an Iphone handy. Still brings chills down my spine whenever I think of it.

STOP IT NOW. No more stories, keep that shit to yourselves.

It is actually comforting to me knowing that others have experienced this. I was accused of being in a drunken stupor when I told my DH what I had seen at his mother's home. Of course, he told her. She said I must have been drunk because in 38 years of living in that same Bethesda house, no such thing had ever happened. I now literally leave food scraps in the toilet whenever I am there, hoping a rat will take the bait and bite my MIL's ass.