An 18-inch whopper the size of a small dog was reportedly collected by a great-grandad who is at battle with huge mutant rodents that infest his yard.
The army of rodents that invades Derek Blamire’s yard to eat his bird feeders has been fighting him off continuously for the last seven years.
The 82-year-old has so far used poisoned traps to catch 50 rats over the previous four years, with his most recent big discovery occurring last month.
Sylvia Blamire, 80, the frightened wife of 6′ 1″ Derek Blamire, took a stomach-churning photo of the monstrous beast being held up by him.
It was around 18 inches from snout to tail, so it was fairly large. A little baby’s length, according to Derek from Blackburn, Lancashire.
It has been making noise for a while.
“In the roughly seven years that I’ve been here, I’ve caught around 50 fish.” I sometimes poison them and other times I capture them.
I’ll keep capturing them if they keep coming. I won’t give up, I promise.
Unimpressed Sylvia said that Derek’s most recent capture had her “scared.” “I was in the bungalow and Derek was outside; I assumed he must be in the garden,” she said.
“Come out with your phone,” he commanded. I want to show you something. He was holding the litter picker as I opened the door, standing on the threshold. It gave me the willies.
Derek, a dedicated gardener, said he thinks the food he scatters for the birds is what draws the rats to the vacant lot adjacent to his garden.
I feed the birds, as you can see, and it goes without saying that rats will come if you do the same. Rats are most likely more numerous than humans.
I provided the birds with feed and fat balls. Birds of many kinds, including jackdaws, starlings, magpies, sparrows, robins, and wrens, are drawn to it.
Rats reproduce rather fast. There are younger, smaller ones as well as older ones.
The younger ones are rather simple to capture, but the older ones are quite cunning and it takes luck to catch one since they won’t enter the trap or consume the poison.
Because I’m used to them, the rats don’t bother me; Sylvia doesn’t like them.
With the older, more cunning animals avoiding the traps and opting to eat from the bird table instead, Derek finds himself caught up in a protracted game of cat and mouse.
In order to solve this issue, Derek momentarily stops feeding the birds in an effort to entice the famished ones into his trap.
“I notice the rats on the bird table,” Derek observed. “They can climb up anything, and they’re really speedy.” They go as soon as you notice them.
In order to make the rats more captureable, I cease feeding the birds for a week.
I hadn’t put out food for the birds in a week, so it was starving when I placed some cooked chicken in the trap, which is how it was caught.
“I fired it once with a pellet gun, and that was all.”
“I haven’t seen any in a few days, but they will return.” They can be missing for a few weeks before returning out of nowhere.