ultra sonics

[hedgerow pete]

as part of my pest control i was thinking about using an ultra sonic sounder to frighten the rats/mice away has anyone got any experience with bees reactions to ultra sonic waves ???

also do es anyone know what sort of frequence and wattage will give me problems?

 

[Frisbee]

I don't think they are all that successful Pete................they are never rated on the poultry keeper forum anyway.

A good mouse catcher is - fill a bucket nearly full of wheat and cover the surface with a good layer of straw, put the bucket in a shed where mice are a problem, let them find the wheat and begin feeding, you will know because there will be straw tunnels, when they are feeding from it well, gently remove straw, keeping it the same shape, pour the wheat out and fill with water, replace the straw. When mice stop drowning themselves in it start again with the wheat.

Rats........well I use a modern poison in a drain/stench pipe......rats love a pipe, keep the entrance and exit partially covered to prevent entry from things you don't want eating the poison. Takes about a week.

Frisbee

 

[jigsaw]

If frisbee is a good soprano you might not need the electronics

 

[Frisbee]

If frisbee is a good soprano you might not need the electronics

 

[jigsaw]

From the look of the caption you didnt quite get that last note.......

 

[Hombre]

as part of my pest control i was thinking about using an ultra sonic sounder to frighten the rats/mice away has anyone got any experience with bees reactions to ultra sonic waves ???

also does anyone know what sort of frequencies and wattage will give me problems?

Save your money Pete. The commercial devices to deter mice/rats don't work half as well as their vendors would have you believe.

Bees have no hearing and so unlike the chugging vibration from a tractor sat next to your hives which will bother them with the vibration, they will be as oblivious to the presence of ultrasonics as you are. A 4 year old might hear a slight whistle from the mice deterrent devices, but years of self abuse will definitely put you, and probably me, well beyond the pale. **

I'm afraid it's back to the old mouse guards Rats come in the night with their own hive tools and don't listen to LF radio programs anyway!

** I spent time on an atoll in the Indian ocean. An almost exclusive male preserve. The occupants of said island were of two types. If it had been a financial rather than a military installation then it would undoubtedly have been comprised of bankers and liars!

 

[oliver90owner]

Two types? You only mentioned one?

Regards, RAB

 

[Hombre]

Snap brother smut!

Similarly, the difference between a baker and a banker is but a single letter.
Of course, i don't have to be a ****** all my life. It tends to be a a general male condition. Am I to assume that you are always perfectly honest?

Because you asked!

Edit by admin,reason:bad language.

 

[VEG]

No need for the bad language in this forum hombre

 

[FenBee]

Interesting method of eliminating mice Frisbee's, but I think you will find that drowning rodents is illegal in the UK.

As for rats - if you are having problems with rats in your bee shed Pete, then you could consider steel mesh on the floor and a couple of feet around the walls. This will keep them out in the first instance.

We tend to have rats around in the Winter, as we keep chickens. My answer is rat traps and an air rifle, but you need to be a good shot to kill humanely and airgun insurance is a good idea as well. BASC offer membership for airgun owners and it comes with a good insurance policy as part of the membership.

 

[tkwinston4]

We used an ultrasonic device when we first moved into our new house to stop the cats going down the side of the house and up over the fence. One cat it worked a treat on and she would back away as if some invisible shield was there. The other cat was not bothered by it at all and she would walk straight past it without a care in the world.

So I guess it will depend on the hearing of the mouse/rat but got no idea about bees!

 

[m100]

Recently I read that the ultrasonic cat repellers upset bees, no idea where but given their lack of hearing I'm struggling to understand why. All I know is that they do stop cats crapping on my lawn, veg and raspberries.

 

[RoofTops]

Bees can pick up vibrations in the air - they use the Jonhson's Organ at the base of their antenna.

 

[roche]

Bees can pick up vibrations in the air - they use the Jonhson's Organ at the base of their antenna.

Bees can hear – although not directly…
“Worker dorsoventral oscillations and queen piping are transmitted through the comb and perceived by vibration detectors in workers tarsi (leg parts).”
Winston - The Biology of the honey bee

“The direct effect of piping is to cause workers to freeze in place on the comb until piping is complete”
Winston - The Biology of the honey bee

“When a piping queen is present, will not chew away the wax and fibres on the capped end of queen cells, the preventing queen emergence”
Winston - The Biology of the honey bee

The dorsoventral vibrations that may occur during the waggle dance are possible picked up by the antenna which have a resonant frequency of about 260-280Hz and the organ of Johnston which has maximal sensitivity 200-350Hz. There is discussion about the significance of frequency and level in relation to the quality of forage.
Summarised from Seeley – The Wisdom of the Hive

So perhaps if you coupled sound into the comb, you could effect movement, and possibly delay swarming…

 

[m100]

Bees can pick up vibrations in the air - they use the Jonhson's Organ at the base of their antenna.

Depends on who you read, Winston's Biology of the Honey Bee says the Johnsons organ is purely for wind speed measurement, while Goodman's Form and Function in the Honey Bee supports the theory of some hearing functionality.

Whilst it is more or less proven that they can 'hear' in the sub 1000Hz range (queen piping, waggle dance etc) their sensitivity to the upper ranges are less obvious which is what I meant when I previously said 'lack of hearing' . Guess I better try one of the cat scarers near the hives

The key question that perhaps has already been answered somewhere, is over what frequency range and with what sensitivity can a typical bee 'hear'?

 

[buffalow]

hi,
I had mice in the house a couple of years ago, the nextdoor was unocupied during building work, anyway a mouse woke us up scratching around under the floor one night , next day i purchased a pack of six electronic mouse repellers and placed them in the sockets ,one in each room. on the following evening i was watching tv and a mouse was running from the arm chair under the tv stand and back for around 40 minuits each time passing within 6 inches of the plugged in mouse repelant, obviously they had no effect on the mice, i changed to plan C, Blue food this was taken well and after about week the house filled with blue bottle flies job done!!
IMO they dont work on mice..frequency

 

[hedgerow pete]

problemis not the shed , has an offical hairry builder i have a certificate from tetley you know, one can build a rat/mice proof shed

the problem i am getting is smethwick as a whole is getting very very rat populated , mainly to many people not keeping rat food off the streets etc etc,
at the allotment i have 16 metal rat traps each set of 4 has a differant bait with places and foods changed weekly, i have 8 rat food boxs with a variaty of poisons in them, proper shop brought rat pioson, paracetimol and wheet, wheet and bi carb, mussiel and crushed glass and finaly mussiel and nicotine, i also have 4 home made rat trap cages normaly baited with meat and an air pistol and two air riffles and a son who loves dead rats, but as the winter approches there is a bigger than normal increase in the rat population and the battle is starting to slide thier way, so iam looking towards adding to the arsenal, as they are getting wise to the traps and some of the poisions, so i was looking at rat zappers and ultra sonics, i am also looking at the older versions of piosons as the slower working versions are not as good as the stronger and quicker to work types, so i have started to look at old school piosons the quickest and easest so far is yew tree berry seeds which 4 are deadly evan to humans, also water drop wort is looking good for the list to