Feb 7, 2012 – A Rat In Disguise?

QUESTION:

In a new customer's home there are droppings in the basement which appear to be weasel droppings. The weasel was seen standing on her young daughter's chest in the morning. The home does have mice, which weasels love, but why would it be standing on her daughter? Would it bite a human? Is it aggressive? She is scared to go to sleep in her own house. I understand that weasels can travel long distances to find food. I know very little about them.

ANSWER:

In your state you have the same species of weasel that occurs throughout the U.S., and this is the Long-tailed Weasel. While finding one indoors is not out of the question I somehow wonder if it is more likely that what your customer saw standing on her daughter was a rat and not a weasel. Given the ability of rats and mice to enter structures easily, and the shock that this mother must have had when she entered the room and saw some kind of animal there, a rat would certainly be a more likely culprit. I would bet that this is a case of mistaken identity, but I cannot swear to that. The feces of weasels are larger than a rat's and may be longer and not nearly as "pelletized" as a rat's or a mouse's fecal pellets. The feces of a weasel will also have hair in it and probably plenty of bones, from the animals that it feeds on. A large percentage of a weasel's diet is birds, so feathers may also be visible in the feces. 

Weasels are entirely carnivorous predators that hunt during the daytime as well as at night. They remain active for most of any 24 hour period. In the winter their hair may turn white to camouflage against a background of snow, and at this time the hair is referred to as "ermine". While they are extremely aggressive hunters I don't think they would be thought of as aggressive toward humans, unless a person tried to grab the weasel, at which point it would defend itself. But, I really can think of a lot more reasons for a rat to be on the bed than a weasel, so it would pay to verify what animal is occurring there. You also need to offer this customer a program of rodent / animal exclusion to ensure that no more animals of any kind can get indoors. I'd suggest setting plenty of rat traps around in this home to see what turns up over the next few days, and hopefully you can reassure this customer that they can sleep without any disturbance. 


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