By itself, a pond will not lure commensals to your home.
However, once you introduce some fish or leave out some food outside, you will attract all sorts of wildlife into your yard.
While rats, fish-eating birds, and other animals are just a few examples of what your pond may attract.
Rats are scavengers and will eat anything available-hott-cold, cooked, or uncooked food.
Likewise, fish are an also a favorite for rats and mice. They are also good at swimming.
For that reason, once you provide an clear path to your pond where you are raising some fish, rats will discover their way to your backyard.
Rats also provide a few threats to you and your pond and if you continue reading, you can find out about those risks and how to prevent rodents from coming to your ponds.
Why Would Your Backyard Pond Attract Rats?
To begin with, rodents will travel anywhere there is food present.
Backyard ponds can attract rats to them for the food source they can obtain, whether fish hanging out in the pond or fish feed that spills onto the grass.
Rats also like to catch and consume small birds, and their eggs, that may have landed in your backyard.
If you have a bunch of junk laying around in your backyard, wood or debris, where rats can find shelter, you are rolling out the red carpet for the rats to make your home theirs.
Rats can find their way into your backyard by escaping from predators.
If you have long vegetation around your pond, these rodents could find home from predators hiding in the bushes or long grass.
What Are The Risks Of Having Rats In Your Backyard Pond?
Rats can have a direct effect on the pond and its wildlife.[/h2]
For example, you could experience a sudden decline in your pond’s water levels with no apparent explanation.
Because rats, a very intelligent species, find ways into the pond. Some rats that burrow to the bottom of the pond and others climb over the fences to the pond.
Rats that burrow into the pond get to the pond liner and start to chew their way through the liner.
In time the liner breaks, and you eventually discover water leaking into the ground. After a while, you will notice you are losing water, and if you had fish in the pond, they will start to die.
The other dangers you have by attracting rats into your pond include:
Rats can transmit diseases
Rats inhabit all types of locations and pick up hundreds of bacteria.
So it should not be a surprise they are notorious for helping spread deadly human diseases.
The most common disease that humans can contract from rats is Weils disease. Symptoms of the disease are fever, muscle pain, headache, and nausea.
Since pond rats will probably find their way to your home anyway, no rodent is safe if you have any around your home.
Rats are also very notorious for spreading,
Hantavirus (which causes febrile hemorrhaging and damage to the kidneys),
Salmonella (a bacterial disease that impacts the intestinal tract),
and leptospirosis (a blood infection caused by bacteria)
Most of the bacteria is carried in rats’ urine.
If they visit your backyard consistently, they urinate somewhere in the grass, your clothing, or the pond.
Bacteria can hang out in their urine for more than a month of activity.
So if everyone that has played on that grass, touched a piece of clothing or that pool has it with them.
Children might be the most likely victims of contracting the bacteria, but even adults lying on the grass can contract it.
Rats eat fish and their food
Rodents of all varieties will take advantage of any opportunities where they find food.
So, if you leave fish food in your backyard, you can almost expect that any rodents in your area will come rafting to your pond.
There is also plenty of food for the rats to eat in your backyard as well, with the most appetizing portion of the meal being the fish swimming in your backyard pond!
Rats are good swimmers, so they will has no trouble hopping into your pond to find something to eat such as a small fish.
Rats will also not even get wet if you leave fish food directly on the grass near the pond. If the food was originally in the pond, they will just jump in and get the food without even getting wet!
One reasonable way that you can manage or deter any neighborhood rats from being attracted to your backyard pond would be to only feed your fish exactly how much food would not lead to excess food for the rats to only eat.
Once rats begin to notice that there is not excess fish food swimming in your pond, the rats may reconsider swimming into your pond to take a fish for dinner!
If a rat swims to your pond for dinner and they perceive risks with getting wet (pond is deep) this might deter a rat from swimming or jumping into a pond to take fish for supper.
Rats could poison your fish
As you can probably tell at this point, rodents are bad.
Rodents are bad for animals and humans.
When rats urinate in your pond, they probably poison the water and put the fish in your pond in mortal danger.
Rodents destroy property
If you have cables crossing your backyard, for example, an electrical cable supplying power to the pump that circulates water in your pond, the rats may nibble away at it, causing electrical shorts or total failure.
The rats and mice in your backyard may also gnaw away at your maintenance equipment, which can be costly to repair or replace.
How Do You Stop Rats From Getting To Your Pond?
If you notice that your backyard pond already has rats in it then you may want to take care of that.
One way to do that, is to fix why they keep coming back into your pond–food.
Eliminating a food source is the best method when wanting to eliminate rats.
This means you will need to resist the temptation to overfeed your fish, or spill any fish food outside the pond.
Additionally, if you have any bird feeders outside of your house, you will want to hang those if you want to take care of any rodents in your pond.
Other solutions to try include the following.
Bring in a cat
Cats are born predators of rats.
So you can get a pet cat into your backyard, and you might actually see improvement. Just remember to use the cat primarily for a rat deterrent and do not let your pets eat rats.
The reason is rats are often filled with disease, possess various parasites, and can transfer bacteria.
Dangers include things such as intestinal worms or even have the threat of secondary rat bait poisoning.
Set up traps
Traps might not be effective for clever rodents, but some will be.
You can place traps at various entry premises.
Heads-Up! Dumping rat poison in your backyard is not something you should willingly consider. The poison could injure your kids and pets who play in the backyard.
Clean up
Mice and rats will stick around if they discover food and shelter. If you get rid of food, they may come back for the shelter.
This is why it is important to remove any debris and waste that could harbor these rodents.
In your backyard, you should trim any tall grass and eliminate any thickets that could provide harborages for these creatures.
Final Thoughts
Ponds attract rats. There are multiple reasons that you might encounter vermin in your home, and a pond could be one of them.
Rats are particularly unpleasant as they can cause destruction and transmit things like disease.
You should get rid of the rodents the very first chance you get.
Do not spill if they are there to eat the fish food you spilled over the pond. If they want to eat the fish, then bring in a cat and let them chase them off.