Agencies and other headaches, keys and cleaners, running costs and contracts...in short, all the things we spend so much of our time doing behind the scenes.<br>
When we were in France at our house week before last we were kept awake at night by lots of scuffling and scratching in the roof space (between the tiles and the inside layer). We naturally thought rats but the guy we called out said it was probably weasels. He put poison in the gutters on both sides and said that would sort it out in 1 week.
A week later we have disgruntled guests who after a sleepless first night we've had to move to another of the houses on site. Not an option in coming weeks when we are full.
Does anyone have a view on the likely identity of our unwanted guests and the effectiveness of the solution?
The problem is almost undoubtedly fouines, stone martens, which are distant relatives of the weasel. Not at all destructive but noisy and can be smelly.
A friend of mine was persistently troubled with squirrels in the loft and came up with the idea of sticking a radio up there tuned to radio 4, so it was mostly people speaking, and they cleared off, Maybe they prefered radio 2?
