The gamekeepers up here on the estate use their terriers for ratting in the game crops and barns.

Definitely! Tonto is from ratting stock and it is taken very seriously here, with groups of ratters all over. They are brilliant to watch work.
Toro may well do well but she may not be as quick as smaller terriers.

Tonto himself has never eaten a rat.... swallowed a greenfinch whole, yes, but never a rat.

My Nan's Airedale Terrier was a terrific ratter, never ate them, he just laid them by her feet!!!

There ya go Elaine, a video of JRT's doing what they do best, ratting! The Martin Clunes series on dogs.

For those offended by ratting please do not watch as rats will be dispatched very quickly!

And for anyone with dogs it's interesting to see how quick they shake them to death. I'm sure we've all seen our dogs shaking their toys.

http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=6QPbZJT1NO0

I watched that on tv... I have to say... its quick the speed those wee jrt do there job is amazing.

FWIW..Elaine, I think torro would try to eat one.........lets face it....it is torro we are talking about lol

That made me laugh - my cats brought in a mouse the other day and my whippets ran away from that

Our greatly missed jack russell (RIP Mozzie dog) was an incredible ratter. We have aviaries and the rats hang around waiting for bits of dropped seeds. All we had to say was Ratsssssss, and Mozzie was out in a flash. She would kill them in a split second and there was never a drop of blood

The kids had pet rats, and sadly one day my daughter had hers on my bed playing. She went off to get something and Mozzie found her rat. The one and only time there was blood - and there was loads of it All very upset, but couldn't blame the dog, she was doing what she was bred to do.

I rat with my patterdale and smaller lurcher. They keep the rats down around my birds. Ive never known either to eat one, its just a shake and on to the next. The Patterdale is quite clean faced considering the amount she catches but they can get nasty bites and scratches.

They can give a nasty bite, I would think a white coated and fine coated dog like an EBT would get marked quite badly, but if its what you want to do, go for it!

We did some Squirrel shooting the other day, a couple unfortunatley were not killed instantly and went into cover. Orey searched them out, and retrieved them, but took a few nasty bites for his trouble. He had a nasty one under his arm and several on his muzzle and head.

With breeds like Borders who have furnishings, the coat grows back well and covers most bite marks, but with the shorter coated dogs it scarrs often.

I owned a JRT that was a working Ratter.........she was brilliant too. Very often Pigeon fanciers in the area asked for her services.

Have to say though I have never known her to eat one.

My son's JRT Pappi is also a ratter, and she has never eaten one either.

I think you'd fine the interest lies in the chase and kill...not the eating.

But the things to remember is that once they have this skill, furries of most kinds are not really safe. I was lucky with my JRT that our own rabbits etc,. she stayed away from, but once out that was a different ball game.
However my son's JRT (Pappi)can not be let out in our garden as she shows no mercy....whatever the furrie

My Shorthairs are both very keen on Ratting round water. They even dig into banks to get at them. But they`ve never caught one. Mice, moles, ducks, rabbits yes - rats no.