Published on 26/07/2024
It was tested on wild rats. And, Pieter Van Der Westhuizen, UPL NZ regional manager upper North Island says, that attention to detail makes all the difference.
An advocate of Generation Soft Bait, he says the product is a lot more tempting – but only to rodents, not non-target animals including farm dogs and companion animals.
“I use Generation Soft Bait on my own property. I have dogs and cats, aviaries and chickens. There have been absolutely no safety issues using Generation Soft Bait. There are no other products on the market like it.
“The original Generation Block Bait still has its place, but Generation Soft Bait has quantifiable advantages.
“And being tested on wild populations – not just lab rats, which is usual - the process was a lot more rigorous and better reflected real life situations.
“Scientists took into consideration wild rat behaviour including the feeding ‘pecking order’. Rats are neophobic - mistrusting any-thing new – so, bait attractiveness is vital.
“And, because the effects of Generation Soft Bait are delayed a bit, once the dominant rats have fed, other rats gain in confidence and follow their lead.”
He explains rats actively preferred Generation Soft Bait to other food sources in trials and it far outperformed any other baits. He says the specially developed vegetable oil and crushed grain-based formulation gets rats’ attention faster, with the soft bait’s paper ensuring the tempting aroma disperses more widely.
Van Der Westhuizen says it’s also very easy to deploy by skewering the plasticine-like bait on the metal rod, or wire, within the Generation bait station. “It’s quick, clean, and convenient.” The smallest non-dispersible bait on the market, Generation Soft Bait kills effectively and in a single feed.
Generation Soft Bait won’t leak or melt and has very good moisture and heat tolerance which makes it practical in a wide range of applications. It also contains Bitrex, a bittering agent, that reduces the risk of consumption by non-target animals including domestic animals like cats and dogs.
Generation Soft Bait is the most advanced anti-coagulant on the market, using difethialone 25 ppm as its active, which rodents can’t detect. There is no known genetic resistance among rodent populations.
Destructive, dirty, and disease-carrying, rodents are among the most serious mammalian pests known to man. A single rat can produce 50 droppings and 50 ml of urine daily.
Van Der Westhuizen says rodents probably cause much more damage than we’re aware of, including fires in vehicles and buildings due to electrical wires being chewed through. That’s on top of the more obvious damage to buildings, loss and contamination of feedstuffs, and posing a threat to native birds and other fauna.
Generation Soft Bait and bait stations are available exclusively from PGG Wrightson.