Hi there,
We installed an AT220 last week and today I discovered the remains of a few ex-rats arranged dramatically in the wire basket around the mechanism. It’s been extremely wet here (Opoutere) and warm so no surprises that they’ve broken down quickly. Does this suggest the trap is leaning back a bit?
This is a common occurrence for an AT220 and happens regularly regardless of how the trap has been installed. There is some suspicion that this can cause the trap to repeatedly fire if they become lodged in front of the optical sensor thereby draining the battery but that’s mainly anecdotal. Something to keep an eye on.
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Yes this is a common issue unfortunately.
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We’ve been using AT220’s for sometime and have seen this. It also means that rats caught up higher act as bait for stoats, weasels and cats, so nabbing them as well! Accordingly placing AT220’s in residential areas should be undertaken with some caution to avoid domestic cats, if that is a concern to your neighbours.
Good advice - but these are in bush areas, unlikely to be a problem to anything other than a feral cat. They’ve been amazing - several possums and many rats since installation a couple of weeks ago. Now we know the rat hang ups are common we are checking them regularly to prevent battery draining.
Hi, Kevin here, NZAT.
The photo of your install looks good. Good height above the ramp, nice size and shaped tree. Looks good…
A few things here:
We think 50% to 60% of the rats fall clear. So if there are bits of 2 or 3 rats stuck there are probably that many again that have been caught, dropped out and scavenged.
Ye, when first installing an AT220 you are best to check the trap a few times over a few weeks, there will be buckets of rats to thin out from the area.
We at NZAT are doing some work to improve the rat clearing from the trap and will keep you posted, don’t panic too much, I don’t think Possums and rats are put off by a fresh rat or dried rat. The melting time between, I don’t know, doesn’t sound tasty.
Kieran, you are partly correct… If the eye is covered the trap doesn’t repeatedly fire but as an attempt to clear the eye the trap will fire once a day just after dark. One of our rat clearing initiatives we are trialing.
Thanks for the feed back team… Kev
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Hi guys, I’ve just struck my first “stuck rat”. and wondered if anyone can tell me how to clear it? I’ve seen quite a bit in the trapping media about “stuck rats” but never how to actually resolve this issue when you come across it in the bush. This is my first “stuck” rat and I tried various interactions with pressing the F Key but it’s still stuck and the trap is stubbornly remaining in the “gone off” position. Is there an easy fix? I have had to leave it in the bush “as is”. (I intend going back in a couple of weeks and will take a fully charged battery in case the other one has weakened itself trying to open up … also the rat may have rotted by then and be easier to poke out. It has only been operational since 24th August, and the battery was well charged at that time. I was surmising that maybe it had made several repeated attempts to reset and then that would have drained the battery to less than an adequate level … First up I pressed the Fkey once to activate. I got the green light and I think it turned the pump over then the light went out. Certainly some lure has been squirted on the dead rat. I tried several times to try 2 clicks or three clicks or 4 clicks. At times I had a blinking red and at times a solid red and one time it made a sort of straining sound like it wanted to do more but couldn’t … As far as I could see though, the big cogs never started turning. I was hoping they would, so I could grab the tail and pull it out. I don’t know how else you can force a manual release … cheers, Tony
Not sure what actually happened after the rat was killed to drain the battery, but I swapped batteries and that resolved the issue immediately. Lesson learned, always bring a spare battery!
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