squirrel damage

dsquared · May 4, 2001

I've enjoyed reading posts for several months now, and have learned much from the site. This is my first post-- and it isn't about tractors! At least I hope not. The "check engine" light came on in my F-150. Took it to the dealer. Wouldn't even link to the computer. Squirrels had eaten the wiring! It cost me $200 to fix, but I think I got off lucky. No fire, no crash... I checked the other vehicles and the tractor, all seems well so far, but I've got to get into a little more depth. Needless to say, I have a trap set. And my lovely "friend of all animals" wife now thinks it is a great idea for me to squirrel hunt this fall. Any hints on trapping the little bast*#ds?

If they did anything to the tractor I'll torture them before I kill them.

RichZ · May 4, 2001

Dave, trapping the squirrels won't do you much good, unless you intend to make it a full time occupation. There are just too many of them for you to even make a dent. The problem is, is that something about your tractor is attracting them, and enticing them to chew the wires. Don't even try to figure that out, you probably never will. What you have to do is make it not attractive to them. The easiest thing to do, is to put some mothballs under the hood, where they won't interfere with anything. Like most creatures, squirrels hate the smell of mothballs, and that should keep them away. Easy, and not too messy!
Good luck!
Rich

bpence · May 4, 2001

I've had two incidents with the little red squirrel devils.

First, they chewed through the wood overhang facing on the North side of the house, getting into the attic. That really torqued my jaw, as I try to have agreements with all of the critters..........don't mess with me and I won't mess with you. So, I set rat traps in the rain gutters and attached them with wire to the gutter spikes. It was interesting when a red squirrel got caught in the trap, started "flailing", and was hanging off the trap and wire swinging back and forth. My wife was a bit distressed, then realized what the little critters were doing to the house.

Second incident involved dog food and my truck's air cleaner. We used to feed the dog in the garage, and occasionally she'd leave a few nuggets of food in her dish. One day I was hauling a pick-up load of wood up from the back and the truck just seemed to be coughing and having a real hard time running. Pulled into the barn and started to check things over. When I popped the top off the air cleaner and pulled the filter, the whole intake pipe was packed full of dog food nuggets........no air flow to the fuel injectors. Since then we feed the dog in the coat room off the garage.

Squirrels can be nasty little critters, at times. My dog has some type of personal vendetta against them and spends some part of every day stalking them around the house and through the trees. Not often, but occasionally, she gets one.

Bob Pence

dsquared · May 5, 2001

Rich:
Thanks, really good idea. They did't get the tractor, only the F150 pick-up truck. There is one particular squirrel that I think is the culprit tho. I'll do the moth ball thing, but I'm going to trap that one little bas&#@d anyway. I set the trap last night and realized that my behavior closely resembled Bill Murrey's in Caddy Shack.

dsquared · May 5, 2001

Thanks Bob:

In my past life I worked for 25 years in a fire department, most of it in the fire marshal's office. I remember hearing about electrical fires originating in people's attics caused by squirrels chewing on the wiring insulation. I never investigated one myself, but heard of several. Keep out the squirrels or buy a whole bunch of conduit and rewire the house.

Glad to hear that your rat traps worked. I'm going to try the moth balls today but the Havahart trap is set.

Bird · May 5, 2001

dsquared, I just came back from visiting my two brothers. One of them was rewiring a 60' cable from the backup camera to the monitor on his motorhome. This is the second time in 3 years squirrels have chewed into it. He also had to rewire some of the 12 volt wiring to his clearance lights. He has one of the Havahart traps set, two artificial (rubber) snakes on the ground where they get in, and he tried putting mothballs in the channel at the top where they chew the wiring. He said they just carried the mothballs out and dropped them on the ground./w3tcompact/icons/laugh.gif/w3tcompact/icons/laugh.gif

Bird

JOR_EL · May 5, 2001

Re: squirrel damage/mothballs?

Since we're talking about mothballs /w3tcompact/icons/laugh.gif (off-topic alert); Where do you guys GET mothballs anymore?

My reason for asking is the off-topic part - years ago my mom used to make a Christmas decoration out of one of those great big "brandy-glass" type of fishbowls. She'd put a mix of something (vinegar? baking soda?) in some colored water, and drop mothballs in it. Some kind od chemical reaction took place that changed the weight of the balls (bubbles on their surfaces?) and they would go up -then down, on and on. Made an interesting colored snowball-fight in-a-jar, sort of thing. We kids loved watching it.

Mom's older now, and can't remember how she did it. Anybody (or anybody's wife) know anything about this?

Thanks,

Larry /w3tcompact/icons/smile.gif

GlueGuy · May 5, 2001

Re: squirrel damage/mothballs?

Sure is off-topic, but not really, as we've used mothballs for years to (temporarily) get squirrels & deer to stay way from something. Doesn't work long, as mothballs in open air decay rapidly.

As for your question:

<font color=blue>Where do you guys GET mothballs anymore?</font color=blue>

I get mine at the local pharmacy. This is usually in small (1#) packages. Don't know where you'd go for larger quantities. /w3tcompact/icons/crazy.gif

The GlueGuy

JerryG · May 5, 2001

Re: squirrel damage/mothballs?

Where do you guys GET mothballs anymore?

Get them at your local friendly Wal-Mart store. They are in the Housewares Dept. close to the clothes hangers.

Bird · May 5, 2001

Re: squirrel damage/mothballs?

Larry, I think I've heard of that trick with the mothballs, but neither my wife nor I can remember what you use in the water. And like the other guys, my wife says you can get mothballs at both Wal-mart and K-Mart. She got me some awhile back to scatter around in my workshop to see if that would help keep the insects and mice out. I'm still not sure whether it helped any or not.

Bird