A FEW WORDS ABOUT THE RAT IN THE KITCHEN SINK CABINET
It happened last year, in 2024. Well, for the most part in 2024.
In September 2023, one of my cats, the one called Sivka (You can see her in my recent post about Piko the Hedgehog), brought a rat into the house.
Sivka does it fairly often, but unlike previous rats, which were dead or half-eaten corpses, the rat that will inhabit the kitchen sink cabinet was alive.
At some point, Sivka released him, as cats sometimes do, to play with him like with a living, moving toy, and I caught the moment to save the rat and bring him outside. I mean, that was the plan, not exactly what happened. The rat survived, but the "bringing him out in the yard" part didn't work out.
I was chasing the litlle rodent around the kitchen, the butterfly net was in my hand, while Sivka sat in the corner, visibly entertained by the chaotic scene.
At times, it looked almost like I could be successful, but nah, rats are fast and agile, even cats must put plenty of effort to catch them - I had no chance.
At some point, the rat entered the narrow space behind the stove and cabinets, so I gave up.
The back of the kitchen sink cabinet is open, connecting him with that mysterious part of the kitchen I rarely clean and see.
The next morning, I put small chunks of apple and carrot in the kitchen sink cabinet and closed its door.
When I opened the door in the afternoon, the food was gone.
I continued doing that routinely each day for a few months, and then slowly, I started to feel the need to make a post about the situation.
A good post needed pictures or footage to show and prove what I was planning to write, so I had to find a way to catch the elusive rodent on camera.
Not once did I see the rat in those first months, only heard his activities behind the kitchen elements. In the following two photographs ...
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... you can see how I prepared the camera to do the job for me.
The cabinet's interior is a dark place, so I mounted a clamp lamp on the cabinet's door and positioned the lamp in a way that allows the door to be almost completely closed once the camera and lighting are ready for the task ahead.
(Enlargeable)
Here you can see how the scene looked from the outside.
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The illuminated interior looked pretty cool when seen through the overflow hole.
The camera was recording the kitchen sink interior for a couple of days, for a couple of hours each day.
In the following video, you can see that footage combined with some soothing free-to-use music I found on Pixabay. This is the most important part of this post. That's what all the work and preparation were about. Have a good viewing.
When it comes to the name of the species, the rat was a Rattus norvegicus, commonly known as the common brown rat.
The rat lived for a year and a half in the cabinet and behind other kitchen elements that form a compact row close to the wall and a narrow open space between that row and the wall, one of the very few areas my cats can't reach.
The rat was permanently under siege.
With the brown rat's life span of up to two years in the wild, it is safe to say that the Rattus norvegicus in my kitchen sink had a fairly long life, after all.
One day, in January 2025, another of my cats, the one called Palchich this time, caught the rat when the rat left his refuge for a moment.
AND THAT'S IT. THE POST ENDS HERE. AS ALWAYS HERE ON HIVE, THE VIDEO AND THE PHOTOGRAPHS ARE MY WORK. THE MUSIC IS SOME FREE-TO-USE STUFF I FOUND ON PIXABAY - THE END.
Rats! Man you must not live with anyone remotely like my wife as there wouldn’t be a moment of peace in the house knowing a rat was inside! Kinda strange as we have a dog and Guinea pig but there ya have it.
Harrowing tale of the hunt and a new room mate!
😀🐭😀
Aw, that's so sad 😥
My longtime suspicions have now been confirmed. You're crazy!
🐀🐀🐀🐀😆😆🐭🐭🐭
You have been manual curated and upvoted by @ecency
I remember many years ago, rat always disturb me I must truly confess. In fact I will say it was really a very tough time for me but I scale through
Sivika brought in a rat? I’m shocked. All I’ve learned and known is that cats and rats don’t like each other. It’s even surprising that Sivika released the cat and not harm it
When it comes to catching rats, I don’t even give it a try. They are faster than we think
🐱🐭🙂 🐭🐱
I get them also 🙈🙈🙈👌
Hahha! When it was supposed to be the cat who would chase but the opposite happened 😂.
I also had that little visitor here at home months ago and caught it using fly paper.
It was a sticky paper intended by mosquitoes but work on the rat too 😆.
🐀🙂🐭🐭🐀
You took away your cats' plaything and in the end they still got to the unfortunate rat. Turns out all the fruit pieces yo we're putting out on the sink was to feed your cat. Hilarious.
This is really charming, simply that. Not everyone pays so much attention to a rat, except my mother and you 👍
🐭🙂 🐭
I guess I'm the natural audience for this blog. Surely you remember my saga with my daughter's mice?
A mated pair turned into 23. 23 white mice that took over my dining room (17X 9 feet!). There were aquariums and cages all over the place. No more dining room table. It became a pedestal for multiple mouse cages. The males could not be left together because they were killing each other. Each male had its own cage. They all had their own toys. The noise of them at night, running on their wheels, could be heard upstairs.
I spent so much money on those mice, and my husband never complained. They all lived a natural lifespan (max: proverbial 2 years).
This saga probably sounds crazy to just about everyone, but maybe not you :)
I loved your rat video :)
I remember the mice story. 🐭 That one is definitely memorable. Rodents are cute...rats are rodents ...mice too ... therefore ...
Even if they didn't have cute faces in a conventional way, which they definitely have ... I don't know, I would like them ... I kinda like the living world pretty unselectively...
Even if it's crazy, your mouse saga is totally cool and crazy in the best of all possible crazy ways.
🐁🐈🐕....
I had an escaped toy living successfully under the kitchen sink for a while, I was pissed when it got into the overhead dry food cupboard - ate holes in bags and shat in the rice. Eventually one of the cats caught it and I learned to keep the cupboard doors closed. The only thing I do with their playthings is kill them quickly to prevent suffering. I don't feel much mercy for the rats although it has occasionally happened
🐭Yeah, I understand ... when humans, weeds, or animals become a pain in the ass, it's kinda hard to like them 🙂🐀
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I'm lucky that I've never seen a mouse in any of the houses I've lived in over the years. I only remember seeing one about 20 years ago when I was very young, at my grandparents' house. My aunt was screaming and trying to run away XD Of course, I don't have a video of that. You've done an excellent job on this. The equipment setup and the footage look professional. Eventually, it would have either died or been caught. If it had died in a hard-to-find place, it would have smelled terrible, so it's good it was caught early.
If a mouse gets into the house, I think our protector Pamuk, will take care of it. She's been lazy lately, even when it comes to catching flies, so I'm not sure XD
🐭🙂🐱 My cats can catch a rat ... but can also bring a living rat into the house ... so, I never know how it will play out ... I never had a rat inside the house until the cat brought one 😄. Pamuk is extremely cute.
This is a big gamble. I hope they're bringing the rats they kill, as usual 😅
This rat turned out to be a real hiding expert. Hiding in the cabinet for a whole year and finally getting caught by the other cat feels like a scene straight out of a movie.
🙂 True, it's amazing how he survived so long surrounded by cats.
There used to be a lot of rats where we used to live, but gradually they disappeared on their own. I love cats the most and I used to have cats some time ago, but I don't have them anymore. In the future, I will buy them again and keep them with me.
👌
🙂🐭🙂
Now this is funny😂😂 how did I read a lengthy post about a rat and want more?😂
This is the perfect Tom and Jerry cartoon kinda scene, the only difference is that you’re the chaser and your cat is enjoying the show.
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A tiny nature documentary unfolding right at home. Truly fascinating!🤗
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https://x.com/lee19389/status/1997047842549256527
#hive #posh
😍😍😍 oh my God, this is sooo cute and adorable 🙃. It's so nice to see that there are people who feel that respect and empathy towards any living being, what you did is so beautiful 🐭🐁🥰. I would have done exactly the same as you 😁🤭, I always do crazy things like that hehehe, and I don't care about what people think 😎, I love animals. I'm sorry the cat killed the rat 🥺😔, poor little friend, that was sad 😥, I would have cried all day 🥺😭. Mice and rats are so cute and funny. You made my day, thanks for being so kind with animals, God bless you 🤗✨. I loved your post.
Yes, it was a sad ending. I like cats, and I like rats and mice too, so I don't like to see their interactions. 🙂 Glad you enjoyed the post.
I have goosebumps just by reading the title and looking at the photo. I had one on the balcony like 15 years ago, that left on its own, but also had ants in the kitchen cabinet on the 4th floor. I don't envy you honestly. It's a very shitty situation and nerve wracking as well.
Well, this one was easy to handle, actually. I have five cats, so the rat was permanently under siege. He lived in the narrow space, almost like a pet in a cage. The rat ate only what I gave him in the kitchen sink cabinet. He never visited any other place in the house becouse the risk of being caught by a cat was too high, so there was no damage at all. At the end, it was caught by a cat one day.
The only annoyance was to clean that space behinde the kitchen elements often, like one would clean a hamster cage.
It was an interesting experience that left something to post about. I'm not repulsed by rats, spiders, snakes, or centipedes. I can let that stuff crawl on my hands any day, so having a rat wasn't stressful for me. I don't need another one, though.
Reading your reply made me remember we had a rat in the office once, years ago and that smell is impregnated in my brain now. We needed to bring in the dog, that caught it in the end, but it was a nightmare.
I'm happy you didn't have to go through the nightmare we had to go through, till the dog was able to catch it 😀
Oh, yes ... the smell is maybe the hardest part. 😀 Dog probably had plenty of fun hunting the rat. I envy dogs' enthusiasm and hapiness when they are trying to catch something.
You should have seen it, he acted like his life was depending on it :) He was unstoppable. I've never seen any dog so aggressively go after another creature :)
😀