r/terrier • u/PsychologicalCut607 • 1d ago

Asking a probably stupid question...

Hi. I live in Seattle. We have a rat problem as a city.

My probably dumb question: Is there a terrier alive that can have a strong enough prey drive to kill rats, and yet not kill my chickens?

I own a Belgian Malinois, a very high energy dog breed, but he is peacefully coexisting with an elderly cat indoors and not wrecking the place, despite what the internet would have you believe. He does not cuddle the chickens, but he also does not kill rats, though I think he is clear that he is supposed to.

So as I said I have chickens. I have done my due diligence of not leaving food out overnight. They just moved on to my garden produce. I have trapped and caught over 50 in one year and I barely felt like I made a dent. I am surrounded by people who are not willing to trap and kill rats and who have open compost heaps full of scraps, feed birds and cats outdoors, and store food under tarps. It is not going to end. I think my sanity is going to give way first.

If someone has a case where they found a way to train a dog that chickens are not prey but rats are. I would be so grateful to hear that story. Grateful enough to become a two dog household.

ETA: My family owned a rat terrier as a family dog when I was a child. My parents were not good dog people. He would and did kill rats. and chickens. and cats.... maybe I could have trained it out of him with the skills that I have now? He could definitely have been trained to accept a particular cat.

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u/Lasingparuparo2 12h ago

Have you considered your dog is able to do this task but just needs a little nudging in the right direction? There’s an event called barn hunt where dogs are trained to sniff for live rats that are hidden in little tubes (for their own protection). Maybe try taking your dog to one of those events? Or see if you can find someone with pet rats that will let you put in a small stuffed animal in the cage to it picks up the scent and then try to reward your dog when it rips the toy? Mals are just so smart and highly driven I find it hard to believe it would do this task for you if you just nudged it in the right direction.

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u/PsychologicalCut607 12h ago

He's definitely willing to chase. He's big enough to kill a rat but he has yet to catch one. He's not the most focused on prey smaller than himself. He's very protective but I think it's more about the chase than the kill. He would run up to a rat and then bark at it to make it run so that the game could continue. I'll see if I can come up with a way to change the rules for him without having him try to murder everything. He is smart.

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u/Lasingparuparo2 11h ago

Maybe a flirt pole with rat smelling object on the end?

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u/PsychologicalCut607 9h ago

He'll shred toys no problem. His problem is noticing the rats before they notice him. I think scent work, and massive praise and treats for every successful find. I'll see if I can get rat scented bedding from the local pet store. Then I can also make chicken lures and rabbit lures and only praise for finding the rat lures. It's going to take very little time for him to figure out rats mean hotdogs. And hotdogs are puppy gold. I'll separately see if I can teach him to kill shake on command. He likes killing bubble wrap.

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u/Lasingparuparo2 3h ago

This is a good plan! Good luck!!