Repairing chewed tubs??

Does anyone know how to repair the concrete mixing tubs that were chewed out by rats? I already have 4 tubs that were chewed out by rats, and getting tired of buying new ones.
I think i saw a thread about this a while ago, and it says to use jb weld. But what kind of jb weld should i use? I was thinking of using hot glue gun. Please give me some advice! thanks!

We buy those from our feeder supplier, cut out a hole that includes the damaged area, and use them as hides for our larger boas. Our supplier just buys a new tub.

thanks for that idea. My boas are not that big yet.

Feed off the chewers and roommates. They learn to chew from each other.

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Originally Posted by MrLang

Feed off the chewers and roommates. They learn to chew from each other.

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Thanks, but they are my breeder females, so I cannot really feed them off.

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Originally Posted by bcr229

We buy those from our feeder supplier, cut out a hole that includes the damaged area, and use them as hides for our larger boas. Our supplier just buys a new tub.

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He also is now bolting/screwing cut 2x4s over the holes. They take forever to chew the wood down and then you just replace the wood.

Pop rivet galvanized metal over the hole, Seal with silicone

Even if they are your breeders, feed em off. Not a single one of my 60+ rats chew. Not one single tooth mark on any of my tubs.

I often sell off my feeders as pets. None bite, none chew, not kill babies. I can literally keep my babies with all the males with no issues.

Good genes go much further with a colony than good numbers.


I like my Dubstep to go Wop Wop Wop Wop

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Originally Posted by OctagonGecko729

He also is now bolting/screwing cut 2x4s over the holes. They take forever to chew the wood down and then you just replace the wood.

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Yeah, he said that's working well.

thanks guys,
i will see which one of the rat is chewing the tub. I will see if i can repaired the chewed tub with those methods, but the problem is that the hole is on the corner of the tub. Putting a wood block at the corner will be quite hard. Maybe i can do something with hardware cloth. What do you guys think?

Maybe try screwing one of these on the corner?

http://www.lowes.com/pd_67407-1277-M...ace&facetInfo=


Though that won't stop them from chewing the rest of the tub.


Do they have anything to chew on? I provide wood blocks for all my rats and paper towels to shred. Keeping them busy is a lot better than them sitting in a box with nothing to do but chew the sides off.

None of my rats have ever showed any desire to chew on the plastic.

Yup just feed them off and get a new tub. In the long run it will save you time, money, and frustration. If they're your breeder rats just hold back some babies. Or buy a new colony. Fresh blood never hurts

ok thanks for the advice. I do have some wood blocks in each of the tubs, so they have things to chew on. But i think that tub have a gap between the food hopper and the tub, so they have the space to chew on it. Maybe if i just fix that, they will stop.

Wish you luck on trying not to feed them off but it will happen or you will keep buying tubs.
I wound up with one tub totally covered in hardware cloth before I finally axed them.

Temporary solution is to use apoxie putty to seal the hole. Long term, find the chewers and get rid of them. :)

1/8" pop rivets and 1/4" hardware cloth folded in half. if there is a gap between the top and screen they tend to chew, raise your tub.

The concrete tubs I've used from Lowe's come with a small hole on one end. My ASFs like to chew on that hole and make it bigger. So, I always staple hardware cloth over that hole before using the tub. I have a 1/4 gap between the hopper and the tub too. I've never had problems with them chewing out of that. If they would, I'd get rid of the chewers. Some ASFs are more trouble than others.

http://img.tapatalk.com/d/14/01/22/ehupegy4.jpg

We also use the nuts and washers.

We haven't bought a new tub in over a year.

Mike gets his tubs from Home Depot.

I get mine from Lowes, they dont have the hanging hole in them and they are not intrrchangable

I just pop rivet or screw a piece of aluminum flashing onto the spot where the hole is, never had one chew through a corner yet though. I just do it as a preventative now, as I seem to have a chewer pop up at random every so often. I also keep the gap as tight as possible without the tub binding excessively in the rails.

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Originally Posted by Expensive hobby

Even if they are your breeders, feed em off. Not a single one of my 60+ rats chew. Not one single tooth mark on any of my tubs.

I often sell off my feeders as pets. None bite, none chew, not kill babies. I can literally keep my babies with all the males with no issues.

Good genes go much further with a colony than good numbers.


I like my Dubstep to go Wop Wop Wop Wop

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I agree with this, any time in the past when I've had a chewed out tub, I fed off EVERY animal in that tub. All of the breeders, both male and female and all their young. Chewing is a learned behavior and rodents learn VERY fast. It's been years since I've had a chewed tub.

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Originally Posted by j94712

ok thanks for the advice. I do have some wood blocks in each of the tubs, so they have things to chew on. But i think that tub have a gap between the food hopper and the tub, so they have the space to chew on it. Maybe if i just fix that, they will stop.

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They will not stop, trust us lol. They will continue chewing and will teach any other rat they come into contact with. I had chewers twice, and down the hatch(es) they went immediately. That was it, no more chewers.

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Originally Posted by Mrl249

http://img.tapatalk.com/d/14/01/22/ehupegy4.jpg

We also use the nuts and washers.

We haven't bought a new tub in over a year.

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I did this because I started out breeding ASF and those monsters chew aaaaaanything. In fact, on the very first night that I had my colony I had them out on the balcony (middle of summer) and I woke up in the morning to a bunch of rats scaling up my stucco wall. Luckily I got all of them back.

The nut & washer thing works a charm.

ok so the conclusion is no mercy to chewers!

I also agree with getting rid of chewers.
But, I did have a chew out in my Siamese bin. Patched it with some mesh wire and didn't have another incident.

You can patch the hole like you would patch a hole in fabric. Drill a few small holes for your strand of wire to thread the mesh onto the inside of the plastic, and tie on the outside like a bread tie. I try to keep all sharp edges curled under. I don't want to see any eyeballs hanging out from getting caught on the wire.

THe last chewers I had, I moved to a large tanks to use them as breeders until my new breeders grew big enough to replace them. The chewers and everyone in that bin and all the babies they produced while in the tank were all feeders.

No more chewing. Sometimes the rats will gnaw at the wire if I'm not fast enough to get to THEIR bin to give out treats/food/water when I'm working the room, but they just bite the wire to get my attention, they don't do damage and they don't chew the bin at all.

I've had both rats & mice and had minimal problems with chewing. 100% of the problems I consider to be my fault, because I left the animals in enclosures that had an inviting edge they could get their teeth on. Not that I necessarily saw it that way until the rodents kindly pointed it out to me by chewing through it. :P By eliminating those with such methods as keeping the bin very tight to the screen above it when building the racks, and some nut & washer type tricks for the silly holes that come in the tubs, I've eliminated the problem.

If I ever did have any rodents that chewed through places such as the sides or corners of the tubs, I'd get rid of them immediately.