Rodent Services

Quit Playing Cat and Mouse With Your Rodents

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Are some creatures stirring, maybe even a mouse or rodent?

Rats are extremely resourceful animals and can even squeeze through openings as small as a dime or nickel. They have a very refined palate, allowing to detect chemicals and poisons at a parts-per-million concentration. Therefore, the use of fresh ingredients as bait is important. Rodents rely on their sense of touch and smell to navigate areas and memorize their pathway, making them extremely difficult to fool with traps and bait.

It’s time to kick out the rat pack!

Up to

36 Inches Vertical Leap Distance

Up to

50 Feet Motion Detection

*Facts and data provided by Highland Pest Control, Inc.

What to Look For:

Droppings are the most common way to know you have rodents. Some rodents will excrete as many as 50 droppings per day. Not sure if it’s rodent or lizard? See the chart below for more information, but lizard droppings often have a white tip, and they’re comprised of insect parts. Here are a couple of ways to know if you have a problem:

Rodents leave tracks, usually in dusty areas

Rodents keep their teeth sharp by chewing on wirings

Rodents leave urine stains that contain odors

House Mouse

Mice are easily distinguished from rats by their size and color. From nose to tail, their total length is approximately three inches. Colorings range from light brown to white.  Due to rapid reproduction rates, the size of an infestation can explode in a short period of time. One female can have five to ten litters per year, with anywhere from three to fourteen babies each litter.

A house mouse prefers to live outside, but as the name implies, they will enter a home in search of food, water or shelter. Outdoors, a mouse will live about a year, but in a protected environment, like the inside of your home, three years is more like it. See the chart above for more characteristics.

Roof Rat

 As far as most people are concerned, a rat is a rat! However, establishing what type of rat is an important clue in determining how they may be getting inside and the best way to treat for them. Roof rats have a long, sleek body, which makes climbing easier and travel along power lines and ledges possible. As the name implies, they’re often found in attics and soffits of homes, and even in the vegetation outside. Their diet is more vegetarian in nature, preferring seeds, fresh fruits and vegetables. When those food sources are scarce, they’ll feed on whatever is available, such as nuts, insects and even slugs. They’re not very fond of cooler temperatures, so during times of cooler weather, your attic is a nice warm spot to call home. To learn more, check out the chart above.

Norway Rat

Norway Rats go by several different names, including house rat, brown rat, wharf rat, sewer rat, water rat and gray rat.  Compared to the Roof Rat, the body of the Norway specie is stockier with a blunt nose and shorter tail.  These rats tend to live in burrows, or on a farm, they may be found in barns, silos and livestock buildings. When it comes to their diet, they’re definitely not picky eaters. They’ll eat cereals, grains, meats, fish, livestock feed and fresh fruits. In other words, anything that may be in your trash. Oddly enough, their daily food consumption is only about an ounce of food, and their water consumption is between half an ounce and an ounce.

How Do I Get Rid of Them?

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Proper exterior and interior sanitation is the first step to clearing up any rodent infestation. Food and water sources must be eliminated as much as possible. You also need to cutback any landscaping and move all storage at least a foot away from buildings and fences.

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Exclusion is the best way to keep rodents outside.  Take a walk around your home or business to look for any openings or gaps under doors greater than ¼”. Holes must be secured with a material that rodents cannot chew through.

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Non-chemical treatments include the use of traps. Traps must be checked frequently, but they allow you to easily monitor your progress. Traps must be placed in areas that are not typically in the way of people and pets.

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Depending on where the infestation originates, placing rodent bait in locking, tamper proof stations around your exterior could work as well.

Having a problem with a rodent right now?

Call us today and we will get rid of it for you.