Community Chat

[occasionalrain]

Check your potatoes, a decomposing potato smells nearly as bad as a decomposing body.

[SeaGal]

Warning: this may make some nauseous!!

Years ago in a rental house hubby and I lived in we had a rat die in a false wall under the kitchen sink. Hubs narrowed down where the stench was coming from then cut a hole under there, stuck a mirror in  and sure enough, there it was, dead and bloated. He tried to pull it out and just a wad of hair came off it, it was soooo gross! I had to leave the room but he eventually got it out, he's so brave!

I had put a bowl of Pinesol down under the sink to try to mask the smell, there was no hiding the smell, it just stunk like dead rat and Pinesol until we found it. Had to air the house out for a couple days.

We had a small apple orchard in back that attracked rats, yuck.

[lovesrecess]

We had a squirrel chew through the thin mesh on our chimney cap and fall down the flue....couldn't climb back up so it died on top of the damper. Had to call an exterminator/pest remover to remove it. ...we had huge black flies on the windows inside and that's how we knew something had died...the smell wasn't too much.... thank goodness this happened in the summer when the damper was closed. We have a two story tall chimney so it took the guy a long time to remove the squirrel. I bought a new chimney cap the next day.

[AuntG]

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@occasionalrain wrote:

Check your potatoes, a decomposing potato smells nearly as bad as a decomposing body.

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I've had that happen too. Stinky!!

[CAMOGIRL]

Feeling punchy this morning ... conjures up Law and Order ... you know, hiding the dead body in the wall ... 😂

OK sorry ... seriously though ... it could be anything ... an unnoticed spill somewhere, a trash bag leak, the bottom of shoes, under the sink leak, an unused bathtub drain...  oh the list is never ending..... 

Try putting out several opened boxes of baking soda around the entire house. At least a few where the odor seems the worst. Open the windows and let in some fresh air if weather permits. 

[Bird mama]

The smell of decomp is recognizable.  If it smells like something died, something probably died.  Mice can get between walls, especially at this time of year. I don't have any solutions to mask the smell, you more or less have to wait it out while your gagging.

[kittyloo]

thanks so much for the responses. This is downstairs in our "rumpus room"  are they still called that? 

i am quite sure it's something dead. Last week "buddy" got a bat, and we found a dead rodent out back. oh, and he is a tenacious  fly slayer. he has a cat door out to the back yard. 

our Russian blue, still will not warm up to him. (been about 4 months now) maybe buddy is "simple"  she clearly is not, and chooses not to associate with him at all.  

no where else to look without punching holes in the wall. have to drag out the incense i guess. 

[Fressa]

Use the X/O spray (I think it's Don Astlet) . I swear by this stuff. 

[vermint]

I feel very lucky that nothing like this has ever happened to me (except for the potato thing--yes, they do stink!).

But, the first time I took the filters out of a new range hood to clean it...a very mummified lizard landed on my stove top! They're the kind you just pull down with a tab, so he just slid off. Now when they need cleaning I get DH to remove them for me!

[depglass]

I had the same problem as Panda123.  DH had installed a wood burning unit attached to our propane furnace.  He worked out of town during the week so I had to put up with thousands of dead flies in the basement and back hallway until he came home and figured out the problem.  A squirrel had gotten into the chimney and fell down into the wood burner that wasn't in use yet.  Of course I totally freaked and he wisely took out the wood burner.  I guess by then one of us was going to go.