Dead Rat Smell

[Brainonska511]

About 3 weeks ago, I saw a rat run along the floor by some cabinets in my kitchen. My roommates had the problem once before and they had some rat poison lying around. I put these pellets out and after about a week or so, the rat ate them. From what I've read, they are slow-release so they can build up to a lethal concentration. Fortunately, the rat is now dead (no longer seeing it, but definitely smelling it). Unfortunately, it died in a place that I can't reach or localize (probably a small hole in the kitchen that connects to a larger junction).

The smell should go away in a few days once the carcass dries, but does anyone have any suggestions for products to mask or neutralize the scent until it does go away completely?

Update (8-16):
So the smell went away after about 6-8 days. Using pushing air in from a window helped a lot. The air freshener was only mildly helpful (and sometimes nauseating when it mixed with the smell).

Unfortunately, now there are a TON of flies coming from the corpse. Based on where I saw flies walking up the wall (before they could really fly), I've pretty much narrowed it down to what crevice the rat died in. With the massive amount of flies in my kitchen, I've resorted to vacuuming them up, but they just keep coming. I might go out and buy a few fly traps so at least they'll all stick to one place. Or just wait it out a few days for them to drop dead due to a lack of food in my apartment.

 

[funkymatt]

get plenty of airflow. we used an orange oil scent thing that helped a little.

 

[5to1baby1in5]

Rat traps FTW

You must sniff out the exact area and remove the carcass. If not, the odor will last about ten days, with peak odor on days 3-4

Edit: I forgot to say eeewwwwww! :Q

 

[Brainonska511]

Originally posted by: 5to1baby1in5
Rat traps FTW

You must sniff out the exact area and remove the carcass. If not, the odor will last about ten days, with peak odor on days 3-4

Edit: I forgot to say eeewwwwww! :Q

Yeah - I actually did get a rat trap, but only after it had eaten the poison. It wasn't until I thought about it more and looked more into how the poisons actually work did I think it could die in a place that would stink. I do have two spring-rat traps for the future. Last time I ever use rat poison.

Time to stock up on air freshners and stick a fan in my kitchen (all the windows are already open in my apartment.

 

[rezinn]

Be happy it's a rat and not your neighbor. That happened to me this year.

 

[Asparagus]

This may be complete overkill, but ozone machines are good at getting the stink out...

 

[Tim]

Originally posted by: rezinn
Be happy it's a rat and not your neighbor. That happened to me this year.

:shocked: This thread is now about this and only this.

Do tell

 

[Chiropteran]

Originally posted by: rezinn
Be happy it's a rat and not your neighbor. That happened to me this year.

You poisoned your neighbor with slow-acting poison and he ended up dying in a place where you couldn't reach the body?

 

[ElFenix]

Originally posted by: Asparagus
This may be complete overkill, but ozone machines are good at getting the stink out...

holy lurker batman!

 

[Brainonska511]

Originally posted by: rezinn
Be happy it's a rat and not your neighbor. That happened to me this year.

What's the story behind that?

 

[Papagayo]

fabreeze..

 

[SphinxnihpS]

Originally posted by: Brainonska511

Originally posted by: rezinn
Be happy it's a rat and not your neighbor. That happened to me this year.

What's the story behind that?

Uhhh, his neighbor died and started to smell.

 

[Brainonska511]

Originally posted by: SphinxnihpS

Originally posted by: Brainonska511

Originally posted by: rezinn
Be happy it's a rat and not your neighbor. That happened to me this year.

What's the story behind that?

Uhhh, his neighbor died and started to smell.

Maybe there's something more interesting than that. I'm not an idiot, I want to know if there was any more to the story than your basic (and fairly obvious) analysis.

 

[AstroManLuca]

You're going to have to do something about the inevitable flies as well. A couple years ago a mouse died in a trap under my bed that I forgot I had set. It was disgusting - one day, there were at least a dozen flies in my room. I meticulously killed them all, only to have more come back the next day. I got really good at killing flies for a while, but eventually I knew something was up, looked under my bed, and realized what had happened.

Within hours of disposing of the carcass, my room was clear.

 

[SphinxnihpS]

Originally posted by: Brainonska511

Originally posted by: SphinxnihpS

Originally posted by: Brainonska511

Originally posted by: rezinn
Be happy it's a rat and not your neighbor. That happened to me this year.

What's the story behind that?

Uhhh, his neighbor died and started to smell.

Maybe there's something more interesting than that. I'm not an idiot, I want to know if there was any more to the story than your basic (and fairly obvious) analysis.

Oh, you bit.

 

[Brainonska511]

Originally posted by: AstroManLuca
You're going to have to do something about the inevitable flies as well. A couple years ago a mouse died in a trap under my bed that I forgot I had set. It was disgusting - one day, there were at least a dozen flies in my room. I meticulously killed them all, only to have more come back the next day. I got really good at killing flies for a while, but eventually I knew something was up, looked under my bed, and realized what had happened.

Within hours of disposing of the carcass, my room was clear.

Yeah. I've noticed a lot more flies in my apartment, though, they are hanging out in my living room, a good 30 feet from where my kitchen is (and you can barely smell anything in there). The holes where I think the rat might have escaped into and died should be getting sealed up by my landlord, so that might help mitigate the flies.

 

[randay]

sledgehammer

 

[Andy22]

Similar story...me and a roommate had a mouse problem. One day we smelled something kinda...rotten. We sniffed around until we centered in on the smell...a toaster. We're thinking some food got stuck in there and was rotting. We unplugged it then turned it over and dumped the contents and out plopped a nasty dead mouse. My roommate screamed loud enough that I never felt quite positive about his heterosexuality after that.

 

[rezinn]

I've lived next door to this old lady for about year, she must have been in her late 80s at least. Smoked like my old camaro and I could smell it in the hallway outside of her apartment during the day. She was acting really weird in the months prior, bringing me other peoples mail and expired calendars for all of these "Save the children" societies and such.

About two months ago I took a trip to california for a few days, and when I came back I noticed that it no longer smelled so smokey in the hallway. This lady lived in the corner apartment next to a stairwell which goes down into the parking garage. Over the next few days I started noticing the faint smell of what I thought was a dead rat in the wall when I walked up and down the stairs to the garage. It was really humid around this time and the air was just getting thicker with this smell every day. I was actually thinking someones cat or dog must have died and they left it in the parking garage or something.

It only occurred to me what had happened when I noticed her apartment being cleaned out and disinfected by a couple people in bunny suits (full body white gowns) with masks and gloves. This place is never cleaned like it was then. A new family just moved in there last week and I almost thought of bringing it up when I saw them walking their dog, but I didn't want to freak them out.

 

[SphinxnihpS]

Originally posted by: rezinn
I've lived next door to this old lady for about year, she must have been in her late 80s at least. Smoked like my old camaro and I could smell it in the hallway outside of her apartment during the day. She was acting really weird in the months prior, bringing me other peoples mail and expired calendars for all of these "Save the children" societies and such.

About two months ago I took a trip to california for a few days, and when I came back I noticed that it no longer smelled so smokey in the hallway. This lady lived in the corner apartment next to a stairwell which goes down into the parking garage. Over the next few days I started noticing the faint smell of what I thought was a dead rat in the wall when I walked up and down the stairs to the garage. It was really humid around this time and the air was just getting thicker with this smell every day. I was actually thinking someones cat or dog must have died and they left it in the parking garage or something.

It only occurred to me what had happened when I noticed her apartment being cleaned out and disinfected by a couple people in bunny suits (full body white gowns) with masks and gloves. This place is never cleaned like it was then. A new family just moved in there last week and I almost thought of bringing it up when I saw them walking their dog, but I didn't want to freak them out.

You have crab grass.

 

[Brainonska511]

Updated original post.

 

[Rubycon]

You will have flies until all the flesh on the rotting corpse is consumed by their larvae. (maggots) :disgust:

That's a disgusting smell. I've wandered down alleys where the rats could not outrun the garbage truck and got squashed. It must be 100x worse inside! :Q

 

[Brainonska511]

Originally posted by: Rubycon
You will have flies until all the flesh on the rotting corpse is consumed by their larvae. (maggots) :disgust:

That's a disgusting smell. I've wandered down alleys where the rats could not outrun the garbage truck and got squashed. It must be 100x worse inside! :Q

It was pretty bad. Fortunately, the smell was mainly relegated to the kitchen. The big lesson to learn here is NEVER use rat poison to kill indoor rodents.

 

[JohnCU]

we had a oppossum die under our bathroom last summer. we had flies for weeks. gross gross gross ahhhhh it was gross. i would set out those foggers everyday to attempt to build up some wall of poison between the house and the flies but it didn't work.

 

[Rubycon]

Originally posted by: JohnCU
we had a oppossum die under our bathroom last summer. we had flies for weeks. gross gross gross ahhhhh it was gross. i would set out those foggers everyday to attempt to build up some wall of poison between the house and the flies but it didn't work.

Zap them with a fyshok, capture at 2k fps and upload to youtube!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ND5gLIiaz-0

The high frame rate is immediately apparent by the switching of the actinic lamps on and off. :Q