Little B**gers

[PhilBrew]

Hi

There was a thread on here a week or two ago where members were discussing the beauty and awe inspiring fascinating-ness of wildlife (ISTR it involving @Clint and @Gerryjo talking about Red Kite and butterflies, but I might have had beer since then ) ... I can't find the thread, and I generally agree with the positive sentiments about wildlife being a wonderful thing ... BUT ...

I've just been to my "beer storage, long term conditioning experiments area" (the very, very back of my garage) and found these two PET bottles, which either Mr. Fieldmouse or Ratty or someone have decided to have a jolly good go at they've managed to chew enough of the caps off (there are chips of black and green plastic all over the place back there) to allow some mould to have a feast, but not actually got any themselves ... BEER VANDALISM



Off for a beer to calm myself down,
Cheers, PhilB

 

[marshbrewer]

My bet would be mice.

 

[Gerryjo]

They are certainly fussy little rascals about what they will drink I see. I would Barr them for being wasteful....

 

[terrym]

Bluetits? Moved on from pecking caps on milk bottles to get at the cream since nobody has their milk delivered anymore.

 

[Banbeer]

Yep, mice wearing there teeth down on anything they can. Last place I lived I brewed in an outhouse and they chewed everything to buggery and I had to give up, luckily now my brewing is done indoors and the farm at the back of us has around 8 cats.

 

[PhilBrew]

They are certainly fussy little rascals about what they will drink I see. I would Barr them for being wasteful....

... they're officially barred, but my worry is they might turn back up in disguise ... you know, glasses and false moustaches

Yep, mice wearing there teeth down on anything they can.

... there doesn't seem to have been anything other than those two bottles "attacked", and there's plenty of other stuff they could have had a go at back there ... now that I think about it (with the benefit of an Elderflower Saison brewed back in 2014 inside me ) there is an empty plastic sack back there that had previously had 25kg of crushed Maris Otter in it (emptied into a grain storage barrel on arrival) and I'm wondering if that's been on top of those bottles at some stage and spilt some malt flour onto them ... which has driven Mr. Mousey to distraction and that's what he's been after

Cheers, PhilB

 

[foxbat]

Rats. Little, actually not little at all, buggers chewed holes through our plastic drain mesh covers outside the house. I guess mice could also do it but rats are very resourceful.

 

[Richie_asg1]

One managed to chew through the petrol pipe of a ride on mower I had. It was winter and first I noticed the smell of petrol, then found a white frost all over the pipe leaking petrol.
I read the manual and apparently replacing parts with non standard ones voided the warranty. Stuff the warranty I thought and fitted a stainless steel braided one. Little buggers just voided my warranty.

- check your wiring hasn't been chewed or things could get worse. One reason I use conduit in outbuildings.

 

[Gerryjo]

One managed to chew through the petrol pipe of a ride on mower I had. It was winter and first I noticed the smell of petrol, then found a white frost all over the pipe leaking petrol.
I read the manual and apparently replacing parts with non standard ones voided the warranty. Stuff the warranty I thought and fitted a stainless steel braided one. Little buggers just voided my warranty.

- check your wiring hasn't been chewed or things could get worse. One reason I use conduit in outbuildings.

I mind when I was sparking going to faults especially in office environments to find mice and rats stuck to cables and stiff as a board or charred. They also are fond of getting around concealed compartment trunking usually buried in the floor and come out dead or alive after you've tried to get through a blockage that you know should not be there and mice are the worst for this due to their size....

 

[Drunkula]

Before we fled the old country my mamma always said "Stalin has been pecking the milk." Maybe it's time you fled, too.

 

[Martin O]

What a pain, luckily I have a fox den at the back of my garden with 4 foxes coming and going, seem to do a good job of keeping rats away...

 

[PhilBrew]

... hmmm, so based on the advice of those last two posts, either I should get outta town, or I should get the foxy bully-boys in for "protection" ... this thread has taken a much more "Godfather" direction than I ever imagined it would

Cheers, PhilB