Firewood storage at Landlady’s place has always been kind of an issue. No matter what expedient we cobbled together it either fell apart in the weather or became an elaborate rat nest. Late this winter, to celebrate her nice new deck she decided to cut through the nonsense and bring a nice plastic bench/chest. That seemed to work fine except that for the past couple of weeks every time I come around to check on things I found the lid wide open…
…and it took me a while to figure it out. I mean if it was only the first time I’d think maybe she just left it open. But I know I closed it, and now it’s open again. I’ve never been bothered with poltergeists.
Spring gets really windy, and the wind can really swirl around that porch in odd ways – especially since we laid down all that exposed floor space. So, since the chest has a couple of locking rings and I have a few little snap links I never found any other use for…
I think that’ll chase away our little poltergeist. If it doesn’t I’ll get worried.
If the snap links don’t work, you always have the option of mounting the trail camera with Land Lady’s permission, of course, to see who or who the culprit is.
Will the rats decide to simply chew through the plastic instead???
Doubt it. The rats are capable of doing a lot more damage to plastic than they usually do.
As it gets cold this fall the rats will chew through the plastic looking for a warm place to nest in that firewood, out of the wind and cold. All of the mites and fleas and disease carrying critters in their fur will migrate to the chunks of wood. Then they will migrate to Landlady and you and whoever carries the wood into the house. Stock up on traps and peanut butter. The only good rat is a dead rat.
ZtZ says: “the rats will chew through the plastic”
Joel says likely not, but if they do a lining made from hardware cloth should discourage the nasty little critters. My (uninformed) theory is that they would go after food far more aggressively than they would just for a new nesting place.