Once built, will the rats still go onto them. I want to place a bait on a stick up on the hut.

I've killed a bunch of rats on the outside of huts in open water. Around here they often have a feed bed on the outside of the hut.

Very effective but you will lose a few to eagles and hawks if they can’t get in the water.

Rats will continue pushing up and building until freeze up. In some cases a hut built now but in a shallow area that has a dropping water level going forward will often not have any activity on the top side. These huts will look dried out and not have fresh vegetation pushed on top. I've found its best to pass on these during open water.

Huts that are actively being worked on will take many rats and often not need any lure or bait. Set a trap where the they are going up. One spin around the hut and these trails/spots are easily identified. Placing trap under an inch of water or slightly deeper works. Stake in deeper water that the caught rat can access.

Set the take outs. And set at least 3 sets per hut.

Please explain. Take outs? What's your set? Conibear on poles or coil spring.

1.5 coilsprings work well. Takeout= where they are climbing out of the water and on to land/hut

I'll second what Deerfly suggested. That's one of my muskrat staples when huts are easily accessible. No bait needed, just press your foothold down into the vegetation right where they're climbing up onto the hut with enough chain or cable so they can get out into the water.

These guys can be a nuisance when using bait and lure especially.

how do you stake a foot hold in all that muck ? or are you using drowning rigs?

Like in deerfly’s pic most house trapper use long stakes of many materials that can be pushed into the soft bottom around most houses that will let the M’rat get out to deep water to drown and keep them away from predators. Most traps are attached with several feet of chain, cable or wire. If beaver are present green sapling stakes are a risky choice.

That muck is the result of a coon catch. Pretty common with close catches to shoreline.. Use straight poles , oversized rings.
A punch set into the side of the house,..not thorough will draw a lot of attention.

If there is only ONE take out then you need to make some other sets on that house and lure or bait is going to catch you more then one rat.

Like others have said, set quite a few sets on the outside as you’ll keep catching them there until freeze up. The coon pic is a good reminder to stake good, I use 2”x2” wooden stakes that I made about 4-5 feet tall to stake and knock on wood I haven’t lost any metal yet

The number of of traps you set on a house is a balance of how many trap you have, have ability to run and houses you have access to. Nothing wrong with taking several checks to take a limited number of mrats available with fewer trap. Not everything HAS to be production trapping. Sustainable yearly harvest should be your goal and how large that is and how much time you want to be in the marsh is my consideration. Also all “huts” are not the same from massive family size(5/6 feet across), which most often have multiple crawl outs around them to smaller winter and feeder houses that have only one good one and little place for more than one “pocket” location. Even if you could place 3/4 traps on smaller houses you would rarely fill every trap a night. I’ve liked unset traps at the end of the day but neither do I like empty traps in the morning for mrats.