Methinks I Smell a Rat

Not as dramatic as Hamlet, but bloody unsettling. We've smelled an animal smell for some time this winter, coming from the cabin heating system. The weather has been too cold/wet to stand out there in the yard and do any searching. Today, with no rain or snow, I decided to take off the glovebox and check out the cabin air filter. The filter was stuck tight, but I worked it out, and saw immediately, the rat shit in the folds of the filter, but there was something lumpy and dark jammed in the filter space, to the RH side of the squirrel cage. I got a flashlight and shone it in, and there was a huge dead rat, perfectly preserved by the freezing temps we've been having. It looked quite fresh and fat, like it was pregnant. I dug it out and it was so big I had to partially drag it out by the tail! Amazing how things go bang in the brain later. I clearly recall hearing a dull bump or bang some time/s recently, coming from that region, but dismissed it as something contracting on cooling, something inconsequential. I think it was the rat kicking, or fighting against being trapped. How did it get in there? Can anybody tell me that? Does anybody know where the air enters the cabin heater squirrel cage? Is it a branch of the engine air supply trunking to the engine air filter? How do I rat-proof the entrance to avoid a repetition? I have rat baits, blue cubes suspended under the hood to avoid a repetition of rats or squirrels eating through the wiring a couple of winters ago. Some of the rat shit in the filter was blue, a sure sign the rat had partaken of a mortal blow meal. But it must have been a slow death, because it had chewed some of the filter and some grey foam from the interior of the heater motor casing. All suggestions appreciated.

 

Look under the cowl above that location in the engine bay

 

Dirty rats!
I have shoot 3 of them in the last month in my back yard.
Sorry no suggestions for you.

 

Hang on

 

Here

http://www.tacomaworld.com/forum/showthread.php?p=4876244#post4876244

 

Thank you for your responses. How stupid of me, of course that is where they get in. They must do this in any vehicle parked outside in the winter, and our place is surrounded by trees and shrubs. Oddly, I'm the only guy in the area that has the problem, and we all park trucks outside, and we all have half acre lots with lots of shrubs and trees. Thanks for the heads up. What a pain it is getting that little plastic strut on again to the glovebox door.

 

OP ... you know you lost 83% of the forum with the Hamlet comparison ...

 

Yeah , the hetero community

 

That's funny shit ...

 

Had the same exact problem with my 06 tacoma 3 years ago but it didn't die in there. The following year it worked itself out and by that I mean a snake had found its way in there and eaten the mouse and apparently once the mouse was eaten it couldn't get back out until it had digested it and shed its skin. Yeah not a pleasant surprise to find a handful of snake skin on top of the cabin filter. I got one more for you guys. My wife has an 11' 4runner and we had the same issue with it a mouse had found its way to the cabin filter and died but she neglected to tell me about the god awful smell for a whole week because she said and I quote "eventually the smell just goes away". I said no it doesn't work that way, you just get used to the smell. Found a nice big nest on top of the filter along with the dead mouse.

 

What the hell is a Hamlet?