Varmint hunting in your kitchen.

[His lordship.]

I am an old veteran at varmint hunting outdoors, air rifles with starlings, shotguns and rifles on crows, etc.  I moved to Texas recently and found a lizard in my kitchen, we are having an extreme drought and heat wave, so animals are seeking shelter, it is only a matter of time before I find a snake inside my apartment.  If it is a poisonous kind I won't try to capture it alive and release it outside, due to safety risks.

My current options are to use my Benjamin .22 caliber multi-pump air rifle, .45 cal ACP shotshells in my 1911, or buy shotshells for my .22 revolver.  I don't want to damage the inside of my apartment, and especially make lots of noise or my neighbors will wonder why there is gunfire going on.  Which option would you guys use if they ran into a rattle snake in their home?

Thanks.

[fr3db3ar]

Hyped up airsoft    Or blowgun hooked up to compressed air.

[snapcrackpop]

a blanket and a heavy object.

[Graybeard]

Make some wax bullets for your Benjamin. I did that as a boy to take out mice in our house. Worked fine.

[jamaldog87]

i used to kill snakes with my Marksman 2000 bb gun and  it Killed many snakes(20 or more). it shot well at 10 yards or less and would stop any snake i ran into, some still were moveing but were dead. the .22 Benjamin  should do the job with a head shot with 4 pumps. But i have found Steel bbs seem to kill better then pellest on snakes.

I would buy a cheap Air Pistol (the marksman cost 15$ or less and looks like a 1911) and use it. also the low powerd bb should not cause any damage if you miss(they will go all over the places and eye wear would be a good call.

[lewdogg21]

As a kid we had a mouse in the house one night when we were watching TV.  My father had me get my bb gun and he shot it dead without moving from his chair.  Needless to say my dad was mega cool after that.

[trotterlg]

My experience with house hunting:


I need to begin the story with a little background.  I live in a housing development with lots of open space, so there are lots of critters around, I also have a barely domesticated female cat that is at least 12th generation Indian Reservation stock, so is very good at hunting.  Now the story:

Late one night after having more than a few drinks I was awakened by a great commotion down stairs.  I flipped on the light at the head of the stairs to see one of the biggest rats I have ever seen.  It was sitting on the back of a chair fending off the cat, which had apparently drug it in for the main course of a midnight snack, which it does frequently.  The rat had other plans, and, being large, aggressive and holding the high ground, was keeping the cat in check.  The wife was up by now watching the whole cat rat fight thing, lots of hissing spitting and biting.  I grabbed up my single cock pellet rifle and loaded up a pellet, lined up on the rat on the back of the chair with the wife yelling at me not to shoot the cat.  One shot mid section of the rat knocked him off the chair, it was a through and through shot with the pellet hitting the Piano (which was a bad thing) the rat then proceeded to run around the living room leaking blood with the cat after it.  The carpet now had little blood spots in pinwheel patterns and the wife was telling me I had killed the piano.  The rat finally crawled under an end table and holed up in the corner, and the cat couldn’t get it out.  I then went to plan B, close combat with was my pellet pistol.  With the pistol in one hand and a flashlight in the other I pulled back the end table, stuck the pistol up to the rat which proceeded to try bite the end off the barrel which didn’t really work out too well for the rat.  With the rat finally dispatched, the cat ran out of the house, I collected the rat, threw it out the window and went back to bed.  Next day was spent cleaning the carpet and trying to patch up a pellet hole in the piano, which I never could do to the wife’s satisfaction.  This is as true a story as I can remember it and is the best house hunt I have ever had.  Larry

[Old Fart]

Sorry a little off topic but it got me to thinking. Dangerous huh?
Way back when I a was a little feller growing up on the farm us older boys all lived out in the bunkhouse.
During winter months lots of the filed mice would try and move in with us.
We started leaving little scraps of food out for them, after a day or so they got real brave.
Then we would break out the bb guns, pellet guns, and 22 with rat shot and have a filed day.
Helped break the boredom of winter nights out on the farm.

[bigvarmnt]

Great story Larry Now I'm off to bed to think about rats and snakes in my room.

[Arier Blut]

Stuff steal wool in every hole that leads into the house. Such as the dryer vent and plumbing pipes going through the floor. Shoot foam in a can on top of the steel wool. No more lizards, snakes or mice.


As a boy we used to hunt mice with the 10 pump bb guns just pumped up twice. Once would send them running away squeaking. Twice would anchor them.

[woodchukhntr]

As a kid in the late 50's and early 60's, I had a friend whose house was overrun with mice (wasn't the neatest house on the block).  Even traps wouldn't keep them under control.  We would watch TV with cocked BB guns and shoot at them as they ran along the wall and set bait in the cellar and attic where we would make a blind and shoot them as they ate.  One time we had about a dozen of them lined up on the driveway.  If I wqas doing it now I would use a pump airgun such as the Crosman 840 with pellets (less riccochetpotential) and just enough pumps to get the job done.

[Dee]

If I were unfortunate to live in an apt. I would use the same thing I used in my house to get a copperhead out of the kitchen. Yes I know, but this IS Texas.
I used a rake and a hoe. Quite, and deadly.

[Lon371]

 Its not on your list as a weapon of choice but, look into a frog gig. It is a 3 prong fork on the end of a pole. Usually you buy the fork and put what ever you chose for a pole on it. Daughter used mine last year when the dog brought on in the house. Sure would have liked to seen that battle   It would be safer than firing in the Apt. Good luck.

Lonny

[Dee]

The frog gig is better that shooting in the house no doubt, but you gonna punch holes in something whether it be carpet, (OPPS the barbs on the gig will snag the carpet), or holes in the flooring or scratches on the hard wood.
With a hoe and a rake you can pin the wiggler to the floor, and get him killed with no damage to the flooring regardless of type.

[pastorp]

Yup, growing up in florida in the 50s the garden hoe was the standard snake killing weapon. In those days there was a lot of construction going on and the buldozing of palmetto bushes would chase the snakes out of the piney woods and into our yards & houses. Daddy was real good with a hoe.

I always liked a gun and in those days people didn't get so upset at the sight of one. For mice I would use the spear plastic bullets in the plastic cases powered by a pistol primer. Worked great. The wax bullets would work as well in a 38 case with primer only. Just push the case through a block of parrifen wax after priming to make a great short range rat killer.

Regards,

[Skunk]

Oh my goodness, the story given by trotterlg is priceless.

[myronman3]

i used to use a s+w 586 357.  really.   i used speer plastic bullets powered by a primer to shoot baats that didnt stay outside.  wax would be a good idea, too.  one thing you should know, the primer powered plastic bullets will pentrate through cheap paneling. 

 larry, i really enjoyed that rat/cat/piano story.  reminds me of the great bat caper of '98.

[Dee]

In the early days of SWAT training with FBI instructors, we used 38 special casings that had the flash holes in the primer pockets drilled out, a new primer, and then the casing was shoved thru a block of canning parafin. We were allowed to wear thin gloves, a t-shirt and fatigue shirt and pants, and ballistic goggles. This LACK of protection bodily gave you incentive NOT TO GET SHOT. You got six rounds in the revolver, and two extra. If you were the bad gun in the house, you still only got eight, with a five man team comin it fully equipped but, dressed just like you, to try and either take you into custody, or shoot you. It depended on you. It was a hoot. When it was your teams turn, it was payback time. I haven't thought about that in years. That would make a good front yard stray dog and cat round. Oh, happy day. I'll make some tomorrow.

[myronman3]

i suppose paintball is about the same concept and that is probably where it got it's origins from if i had to guess.  which is another thing that surprises me, i have never gotten into paintball.   we used to use the m.i.l.e.s. system for wargames in the army, and let me tell you some of those games we played very rough.  there was more than one time people ended up busted up.   good times.  

   another thought....how about a paintball gun if you have it for indoor vermin control?  do they make a paintball without the paint?  i can see it now, the mrs. comes home to a house with a new polka-dotted paint scheme....lol.   seems like it might be an idea if a fellow were already set up for it....or wanted a divorce.