Schrödinger's Rodent update
We decided to stop being wusses and investigate. To be honest, it's a nasty pong but not overwhelmingly rank. It was a bit hard to tell when I got home last night, because Simon had lit a lot of candles, and I was going from his description.
Turns out the pong is not in the attic at all. In fact there is a fresh breeze when you stand below the hatch, and only fresh air up in the loft space. The smell is in the back room, with a tiny tiny whiff in the kitchen below. So I reckon it's one or more mice, under the floorboards. There's no way anything larger like a rat or a squirrel is in there; whereas we've spotted a mouse in the house recently and are trying to get rid of them.
I called a local pest control company. He thought it would take around three days for a mouse smell to go. Mice decompose pretty quickly, down to skellingtons. And more like ten days or fortnight for a larger rodent. I asked about the flies. He thought that we should be OK; there are no flies in the house currently, and there won't be any light to attract them into the main rooms. His advice is to go on holiday and forget about it! Pulling up all the floorboards would take hours, and be a nightmare to fix again. We definitely wouldn't get it done in time to go on holiday. And we can't get anyone to do it today in any case.
We're going to risk it...
Edited to add: FOUND IT! dead very small rat. Without wanting to squick people out, it was wedged behind a pipe in the hot water tank cupboard - Simon spotted a tail and a head when he went to turn the heating off. We had to pull the cupboard out and employ tongs, bin liners, gaffa tape and latex gloves. Silver lining: marital bonding in shared adversity.
Turns out the pong is not in the attic at all. In fact there is a fresh breeze when you stand below the hatch, and only fresh air up in the loft space. The smell is in the back room, with a tiny tiny whiff in the kitchen below. So I reckon it's one or more mice, under the floorboards. There's no way anything larger like a rat or a squirrel is in there; whereas we've spotted a mouse in the house recently and are trying to get rid of them.
I called a local pest control company. He thought it would take around three days for a mouse smell to go. Mice decompose pretty quickly, down to skellingtons. And more like ten days or fortnight for a larger rodent. I asked about the flies. He thought that we should be OK; there are no flies in the house currently, and there won't be any light to attract them into the main rooms. His advice is to go on holiday and forget about it! Pulling up all the floorboards would take hours, and be a nightmare to fix again. We definitely wouldn't get it done in time to go on holiday. And we can't get anyone to do it today in any case.
We're going to risk it...
Edited to add: FOUND IT! dead very small rat. Without wanting to squick people out, it was wedged behind a pipe in the hot water tank cupboard - Simon spotted a tail and a head when he went to turn the heating off. We had to pull the cupboard out and employ tongs, bin liners, gaffa tape and latex gloves. Silver lining: marital bonding in shared adversity.