RATS! Literally.

The Monkey Man and I were out in the garden yesterday, harvesting tomatoes. I have been noticing recently that alot of my Golden Boys have had big, chewed-out sections. At first I thought it was another tomato worm, but there was no telltale poop and all of the tomatoes that were chewed were close to being ripe and close to the ground. Tomato worms usually attack green fruit closer to the top. Anyway, a minute or two into harvesting we heard this big rustling and I caught a glimpse of something racing out of my bed and through the hole in the fence! Eeeeek! I did not actually witness what it was but Monkey Man said it was some sort of rodent. He said it was pretty big, but then he's never really seen a rat and a mouse together to compare size. He is convinced it's a Harvest Mouse, since logically, it has been harvesting our tomatoes, but from the size description, I'm thinkin' it's a rat. When I looked through the fence, I didn't see it, but did notice that my neighbor has a shed that doesn't sit flush on the ground and there is a whole bunch of wood rot and straw under the shed (what a nice, warm little home for a family of ratties). We also had several folks at our BBQ awhile back state that they saw a portly rat cruising along the top of the fence. So there you have it. But what do I do about it, they seem to be living in my neighbors yard and they are renters that could give a hairy rat's ass (no pun intended) about maintenance and upkeep of the property. And I certainly don't want to lay any traps in my yard, for a couple of reasons. I don't want the dog to get caught up in it, don't want the kids to get snapped and as stupid as it may sound, I've had rats as pets and I just couldn't kill one to save my life! But at least now I know what gets the dog all worked up after dark! Time to patch the holes in the fence. I know that won't take care of the problem 100%, but maybe it would make it more difficult for said rat to raid my garden!