Holy Big Rats...

You need bigger traps

Have you Reyes the 5 gallon bucket trap? You can catch multiple rats. You fill the bucket with enough water so they can't jump out. YouTube it for info how to make them. 

I had a big rat problem in the attic a while back and tried those same Tomcat traps. For whatever reason they caught a lot of feet and had a lot of misses. I had to tie a piece of string to each one and staple the string down to a ceiling joist with a staple gun to keep them from crawling off into a crevice. One evening it sounded like a two raccoons were fighting in the attic and I went up there to find a rat with his leg caught in the trap. He had the string at full extension and was banging the trap around like crazy.

I did some research and found that the pros seemed to like the victor M326 (slang name 'Victor Pro Rat Trap'). I never found any in stores and had to get them on Amazon. They are much easier to set to a hair trigger than the old style traps. You set it safely with normal sensitivity, then take a stick and tap the yellow pedal down until it is a hair trigger. You can even do creative things like nail/screw the trap to the side of a fence or wall and catch rats that brush up against it. After I switched to these I didn't have to tether traps any more - I only caught DEAD rats. 

+1 on the victor traps. I had one set in my garage and it kill a squirrel that wandered into it.

Sounds like a BIG BORE may be in order.

For a NEVER miss on a Victor take two of them and screw them down to a piece of wood where both close towards the middle (just be extra careful when setting them). Works great on standard mouse traps for mice that are trap smart too.

Thurmond

"hahner30"+1 on the victor traps. I had one set in my garage and it kill a squirrel that wandered into it.

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This reminded me about the weasel boxes people build. The victor traps are the primary ingredient. A weasel box ought to be good for any rodent small enough to get into it and do a decent job of keeping larger animals out...as long as they don't stick their paw in there!

I have 8 Victor old style rat traps put away and bagged up. They can be very useful and are cheap... Almost all other brands don't work and hold anywhere near as good as this old fashioned trap.

wll2506

Here's a spin on T3Pranches idea I mounted the traps to the wall place them at about 6-7 inch height for the bait trip pad. Then I made a 3 sided protective box that sits over the trap yet has enough room to allow it to snap. The rat smells the bait is comfortable reaching up. His head only has one position, no walking up the wrong side, no pets can get in it. Scale it down it's equally effective for mice. My uncle had a furniture factory, the other half of the building was a main distributor for Lay's potato chips. If they get totally out of hand a drown drum is a nice trick. A bar drilled thru the center with a piece of sheet metal mounted in the middle, at each end we used the old metal 35mm film cannisters filled with bacon fat, or sardines. You secure the cannisters to the ends of a 3"X12" sheet metal with screw eyes. With Duolock fishing snaps and a small sinker it keeps the board even. The rats walk the bar or jumps from the rim the board tilts the rats end up in the drum. Much more fun would be a nice semi with nite vision