Andrew's not our only pack rat.

Sunday morning I started the van to leave for church.  I noticed right away that the AWD and ABS lights were on along with the exclamation point in a triangle.  The screen on the dash told me to have my vehicle serviced.  I was puzzled (yes, puzzled) because the van was completely fine the night before.  I went back in the house to ask Brian to check it out and we noticed that the bag of garbage I had set in the garage the night before had been ripped (chewed) open.  I made it to church and home again fine but we knew we had some kind of critter in the garage and we worried it had gotten under the hood of the van and chewed something important.  Sure enough!  We opened the hood and "it" had chewed up some insulation and was making a little home for itself.  And sitting on top of the air filter was one of Andrew's Barney socks. Andrew leaves crap EVERYWHERE!  Who knows where that was - somewhere in the garage I guess.  After talking to a neighbor, we concluded that we had a pack rat.  And since then we've talked to lots of people who deal with pack rats two or three times a year.  I was relieved to hear that it's not just us.  

We had a little gap in the rubber at the bottom of the garage door and that must be where it got in.  I talked to a friend with some experience in exterminating pack rats. We set up some traps (just open rat traps) with a little peanut butter on them and this morning....bye bye ass-rat.  Andrew was thrilled and couldn't wait to see it.  D-E-A-D.

I took the van to the dealership this morning and was holding my breath all day that it wasn't thousands of dollars in damage.  It chewed through a wheel sensor and that has to be replaced to the tune of $365.  Could have been much worse, but that still stinks.  

 

We're keeping the traps up in case there is more than one but I hope we're done with this rodent adventure!