Last week Mrs Rocker and I came home to hear cat sounds in our house. We checked each room but found nothing. Still the sounds went on, it was hard to pinpoint their source, the only location could be in the attic. As soon as I opened the attic trap door, the sounds stopped. I went up and looked around but nothing. I thought I heard a bird chirping now and then but no sign of anything. Back in the kitchen and shortly after closing the trap door, it started again. By this time I had removed the batteries from the smoke alarms, having heard in the past that they make bird sounds when the battery is running low.
Nothing for it but up into the attic again. And again the cat sounds stopped when the trap door was opened. This time I switched off the attic lights to check if light from outside was visible, thus showing where an animal could enter. Nothing, but as earlier, the occasional bird chirping sound was heard. The attic was very cold, exactly what Mike Holmes would describe as a 'cold zone'. I decided to unplug the ultrasonic rodent deterrents [they don't work and are a waste of money], but only one was switched on.
Back in the kitchen again and this time there were no cat sounds. I plugged the ultrasonic devices into mains sockets to test them, the one that was in use in the attic soon started to chirp - bird like - while the unused one remained silent. Both are now in the recycling bin.
Probable cause is that the working ultrasonic device developed a fault and produced cat like sounds due to the extreme cold in the attic. And opening the trap door let some heat into the attic, heat that caused the device to change pitch to bird like chirps. As for the smoke alarms both are replaced with new units as they were long past their expected life [around 10 years].
What a day! Anyone had a similar experience?
Insanity: doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results. [Albert Einstein]
Nil Satis Nisi Optimum
Comments
I hope you didn't put the old smoke alarms in the bin - the reason they have a life span is because the detector uses a small radioactive source, which decays over time. They need to be properly recycled - or at least disposed of somewhere that takes hazardous waste.
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Sounds like David Attenborough's latest series of wildlife programmes, where pets are filmed around the house in HD. The trailer for next week's programme was on last night, "Tarantula on TV."
There are probably others, but I haven't thought of them yet.
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