How to find and remove a dead rat?

This can be a tough task to handle. Rats are always on the move and they could die anywhere in your house. The most likely places where you can find a dead rat are an attic and inside the walls. If you felt that horrible and disgusting smell of a dead rat, you will try to find it. You should probably need to cut a hole in the wall or to dig up insulation in the attic in order to find and remove a dead rat. So, basically, you have to use your nose like a dog if you want to locate a carcass before the smell gets even worse.



In case that rat was poisoned inside the house, it will almost certainly die inside. They could die in the walls and usually on the bottom. That’s why you need to cut a hole and take it out. Remember to wear thick gloves while removing a rat. Spray the place with the special enzyme-based cleaner which is very effective in destroying biohazard waste. After that, patch up the hole and open the windows and doors in the house. The nasty odor should go in an hour or two.

Finding and removing a rat in the attic can be trickier because of the better airflow up there. That will certainly make it a lot harder for you to detect a dead animal. The attic is very good ventilated; however, the smell of the decomposing body is strongest in the room below the very place where the rat died. Depending on the architecture of your house, removing the rat from the attic can be a problem because some places are very hard to reach, almost impossible. Attics can be narrow and tight, so it will not be a piece of cake to crawl in. If the place is inaccessible, you can cut the hole in the ceiling below the exact spot and remove a rat in that way.

The important thing is to act quickly, as soon as possible after the detection of the bad odor. Make sure that you clean all the maggots along with the dead body because in 21 days the maggots will become flies. And then you will have those annoying creatures in your house. They will not be a couple of them or a few, the whole legion of flies will bother you every day if you don’t act fast and remove the dead rat. Never touch the rat with your bare hands and you can use the mask for your face as well.

Go back to the How to get rid of rats home page.

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