Plan to exclude rats and water

Hi,
I wasn't sure which forum to post this in, as there was no a drainage or foundation forum. If there is a better place for it, please let me know.

My mom's house has a rat problem, and a damp basement problem. Most of the rat holes are around the base of the house. It is an old house with a fieldstone foundation with basement on one side, and crawlspace on the other. She has a lot of bird feeders, keeps chickens with unlimited open food, and has a dog and cat with food in their bowls all day and night inside the house. I am working on those things with her, but I think I'm looking at physical exclusions here for the rats and the water.  

Do you think this plan would deter rats and help with drainage (and by effect, help with the damp basement)?

My plan is to dig down maybe 2 feet (however deep rats normally go) right next to the foundation. I would use lime based mortar to seal up the fieldstones. Then I would either pack the dirt... or just dig it on an angle to make the water run away from the foundation. I would then put in some crushed rocks, add a drain pipe, and then fill the rest of the hole with crushed rocks. My hope is the loose rocks will make digging hard for the rats, and the mortar would block up all the holes if they did dig down. The drain would go around the house and connect with another drain and go out to the ditch by the road.

Also, my first thought was to put the drain pipe in the middle under the eaves... but now that I look at my sketch again, I wonder if it should be at the bottom of the slope. Pardon my bad drawing, and any thoughts are welcome.

Getting the water away from the building is the first step to take.
- Can you create a slope on the surface that pulls the water away from the walls?
- And have a spoon drain at that point for a start, taking the water to a better place?
If the basement does not start to dry out, investigations first may be a good idea.
The use of Lime mortar is excellent.
Somehow dealing with the mice is a bigger issue, in Australia snakes would move in and keep them ast bay.

Hi Matt, You are a really good son.

You bring up 2 issues... water and rats.

Second issue first.... RATS.... I bought my old place 12 years ago. Realized that there was a huge rat problem in the crawlspace under the house. The house was more than 50 years old so I wasn't surprised. About 10 years after it was built someone else bought it and made major changes to it. Busted big holes in the foundation to run more plumbing and drain pipes but never sealed these openings to keep out the vermin. Rats had been nesting in the crawlspace for 40 years or more. I dug out a couple of rats nests from the crawlspace that were 10x10 feet and 18 inches deep! So gross!!! I practically wore a hazemat suit to do it, sprayed enough bleach water to kill half the planet and used a hoe to pull the stuff onto plastic and roll them up. I'm sure it looked like I was pulling body bags out of my crawlspace when I was getting rid of them! I dug down around the foundation and uncovered every opening and poured buckets of concrete over them. It worked but... for several years the rats kept trying to find new ways in. Apparently, they give birth every few months to a dozen or more pups and each pup remembers where it's original home was and they try to keep coming back. And John's right, I caught snakes from anywhere on my property and tossed them under my deck to finally discourage the rats! It worked. So it might take awhile to put this issue to rest but it's totally doable!

First issue, Water... Your proposing putting in a french drain. Good idea, they work well. And John also has a another good idea, create a slope so the water will run off. That is simple and super effective. I remember decades ago when my mom had a similar problem with water. The sump pump in her basement would run nonstop during rainy weather. She hired a company to come in and fix it. They dug down around the foundation and covered the foundation wall with some kind of waterproof coating or spray and then they installed the french drain. It worked well and solved her water problem.

John is awesome as ever and you are a good son.

Hi John,
Unfortunately the house is at the bottom of a large hill. Not a mountain or anything mind you, but big enough and steep enough that there is a lot of water coming down the hill. The hill is probably half again as tall as the two story house. Without creating some sort of weird ditch cut into the side of the hill... I don't see being able to slope things on that side. Another side has a septic tank that is about 3-4 feet above the foundation and not that far away (small plot). One other side is flat, and I might be able to do something there. The front is already sloping away from the house.

Matt McSpadden wrote:Unfortunately the house is at the bottom of a large hill. Not a mountain or anything mind you, but big enough and steep enough that there is a lot of water coming down the hill. The hill is probably half again as tall as the two story house. Without creating some sort of weird ditch cut into the side of the hill... I don't see being able to slope things on that side. Another side has a septic tank that is about 3-4 feet above the foundation and not that far away (small plot). One other side is flat, and I might be able to do something there. The front is already sloping away from the house.

Is it possible to create a berm rather than a ditch that directs the rainwater away from the foundation?

With the french drain between the berm and the foundation?

There is not a lot of room on the worst side between ground level and where the siding starts, maybe 6-8 inches. That might be enough. In my head, the slope away from the house was below ground level. John and Ann seem to be suggesting doing it above ground.

It is tough, because a less than 2 feet out from the house, the ground is higher than the siding on the house. I'm just not sure how far away from the house I would have to dig down, in order to make a berm work. Maybe something like this? Almost making a trough for the french drain right next to the house? Similar to my original idea, but closer to the top?

Why not go up behind the house and install a spoon drain to sweep ant runoff past the house?
This site listed below shows a clever way to deal with a number of problems;
Public-Guide-to-Stormwater-Drainage-print.pdf