I smell a rat
 

Literally!! At least I hope its not a rat but a mouse.

Obviously one died somewhere in the house. We're paying for it with a god awful smell. The challenge is that I cant find the damn thing. IM super sensitive to smell, so this is driving me absolutely up the wall.

Any suggestions? I cant trace back where the smell is coming from. We do have a basement, unfinished with some things down there which creates hiding places. Cant find anything.

???????????????

Rat
 

Borrow a cat or dog. They should go straight to it. Jon

Ive had my dog sniffing around down there for a couple of days. Nothing.

I had a similar situation several years ago. We narrowed the odor down to a closet in a spare bedroom that was full of my wifes shoes, shoe boxes etc. We emptied the whole closet and found nothing, but the smell was obviously coming from that closet . Finally, on a hunch, I went up in the attic and directly above that closet I found a dead racoon that had found his way in under a piece of loose soffit. Had to not only remove him, but about four trash bags of blown in insulation---not a fun project. I thought something that big would smell a lot worse than a dead mouse, but I guess the fact that it was separared by the ceiling and the insulation made the odor exactly the same.

Hope this isn't what's going on in your house, but if that smell doesn't go away in a couple days, you better start looking.

Two nights ago, its clear something was trying to get in via some sort of outside vent on the roof in the middle of the night. Woke both me and my wife up because it was above our bedroom. Went on and off for a half hour. It sounded like something that had some weight to it based on the clunks we heard. I went outside with a flashlight and saw nothing. By the time I got back inside, the sound was gone. Figured I scared it away. But yesterday I felt compelled to go into the attic. Nothing but undisturbed blown in insulation.

I turned the heat off a couple of hours ago and the smell seems to have dissipated. Im thinking something is in the heat vents?

Good possibility you have some sort of "critter" in there. Frustrating situation---hope you get it figured out soon.

...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4NFzEW8rSWc

We had a mouse crawl down our dryer vent into the dryer and die and while that smell was bad enough the wifey started yelling at me she didn't think my "joke" was funny. She saw a snake on the floor and thought it was a rubber snake I had left for her. When it moved, she freeked. Turns out a rubber boa snake followed the scent of the mouse down the vent, into the dryer and got out of the dryer for the wife.

Set some traps, where there's one there's more! At least if you catch one you might be able to narrow the search area.

Heat?
:eek:

Do you use propane or natural gas?

:confused:

If you have a single-story house, open the access door to the rafters and look up there.

adopt a cat and throw it in where the smell is coming from

I smell a pleasant smell coming from a slow cooker and it isn't cat or rat.

Yeah, open a can of tuna outside, leave it at your back door, and see what appears. Works around here (even without the tuna they appear).

Or you could just ask for Bill The Cat, he might be available!!!

http://allcartoonpictures.com/downlo...l_the_cat1.jpg

Chinese restaurant?

OMG NO!!!!!!!

Those chicken sticks I have been wanting somehow seem, not so interesting now!..

Im going through the same thing right now. At first I thought it was my rug in the family room, maybe the washer leaked in the laundry room. But now that I have pulled some outlets away from the wall I can tell something died back there, probably a bird. I guess all you can do is buy some scented candles and wait it out but I know how they were getting in which has been fixed.

Natural gas.

Two story single fam home.

That makes me feel so much better Keith. :)