Understand Rodents & Start Rodent Control
There are three types of are rodents that can create chaos and destruction to your home and while rodent control can seem tough it’s necessary to prevent thousands in home repairs. They are mice, rats, and squirrels. Mice and rats differ in body size, snout shape, tail composition, and ear length.
Mice & Rats
Mice are smaller then rats and their noses are shaped more like a triangle while rat’s noses are shorter and flatter. A mouse has a thin, fury tails while a rat has a thicker, scaly tail. Mice also posses large, floppy ears relative to their size, and rats have regular sized ears relative to their size.
These two rodents are similar in their coloring. They both come in brown, white, and gray colors and are both nocturnal. The most common mouse found in Texas in the house mouse. House mice are typically one solid color throughout and have the larger eyes and ears. House mice are found in more urban areas like parks, backyards, storage sheds, and in your home. They like to find their food from human sources and are considered very opportunistic eaters.
Rodent Control In Houston
Houston has two different types of rats that are found most often keeping Rodent Control in Houston a buzzing business. These are the Norway rat and the roof rat.
Norway Rat
The Norway rat is brown to gray in color, larger in size, and has a smaller tail.
Roof Rat
The roof rat on the other hand is blackish with a whiter belly, smaller in size, and has a long tail.
What Rat Is In Your House?
One of the biggest differences between the two is that Norway rats stay as close to the ground as possible while roof rats like to shelter above the ground. Norway rats will enter your home from pipes and holes that are located along your foundation and roof rats will enter through the holes and gaps in your attic. What you will notice is the same about these two types of rats is their droppings.
See Rat Pellets In Your Home, Get Rodent Control Fast
If you see rat pellets then you know one of these species has taken residence in your home. You should consider rodent control fast as these pest can chew up wiring and insulation causing hundreds or even thousands in rodent damage.
Squirrel, A Rodent In A Fancy Coat
The other rodent often found in your home is the squirrel. Squirrels are much larger rodents. They are best recognized by their long, bushy tails. Squirrels have big, round, dark eyes, and range from black, gray, and brown in color.
Rodent Damage
What all three of these rodents have in common is the “rodent damage” they can cause to your home. Mice, rats, and squirrels will enter your home through cracks and holes they find in your attic or crawl space. If the whole is not quite big enough they will chew a bigger hole until they can fit through it, causing great damage. Once inside these rodents will start getting comfortable and making your home their nesting site.
Rodent Nest
These rodents will make their nests out of anything they can find that may be suitable for comfortable bedding. This includes a range of items such as the insulation from your walls, clothing, blankets, upholstery, towels, and cardboard. Once the rodents have set up their nesting space they will begin to cause more damage to your home by chewing through walls and roof tiles. They do this so that they have multiple access points to outside and inside your home.
Mice, rats, and squirrels will all chew through the wiring in your home as well. They chew wires to keep their teeth from growing too much, keep them sharp, and keep them well maintained.
Squirrel Vs. Rat Vs. Mice
One thing that is different between squirrels from mice and rats is that squirrels are trying to find nuts and acorns as their food source so they are entering your house to find shelter. That is the key difference between squirrels invading your house as opposed to rats and mice.
Rats and mice are not only looking for shelter, they are searching for food. Mice and rats will eat any food items you have that they can gain access to. This includes cereal boxes, crackers, sugar, and flour to name a few.
Start Rodent Control & Stop Rodent Infestations
Having a rodent infestation can cause serious health issues for some individuals but the problem can be avoided all together with professional rodent control service. The particles that can come from rodent urine and feces can cause some people to have dramatic allergic reactions and asthma attacks. This doesn’t even include the numerous diseases we can catch from rodents.
Rodents Can Carry Disease
Rodents can carry the bubonic plague, Tularemia, Rat-bite fever, Lassa fever, and Hantavirus Pulmonary Syndrome, just to name a few. They can also carry fleas and ticks that can bite them, then bite you, your family members, or your pets, passing along even more diseases.
Steps To Rodent Control
There are a few measures you can take to try and treat your mice, rat, and squirrel infestations.
- First you should call a professional pest control expert. They will identify where these rodents may be entering in and out of and give you a step-by-step plan of action.
- Secondly, it is essential to remove all of your homes insulation. Even if you think the rodents have not damaged a certain section of insulation there is no way to be sure. There could be urine that you cannot detect with the naked eye hidden down in the insulation along with droppings that can’t be seen either. Not removing this insulation can leave harmful toxic waste that you and your family continue to inhale, not knowing the damage it is doing. The other reason this is a good idea is that rodents are very territorial. If they smell the slightest whiff of urine or feces they will continue to find ways to enter your home, thinking that it is their space.
- The third step is to disinfect and sanitize everything. This step not only will kill any diseases left behind it will also kill any lingering odors, which will prevent the rodents from coming back. Next, you are to seal up any and all entry points, gaps, and holes that you may have that is allowing the rodents to enter. This includes spaces like the attic, crawl space, gutters, roof, pipes, and utility contact points.
- Lastly, you should install brand new insulation. This will ensure previous rodents do not return and will probably save you money by having updated insulation.
To maintain a rodent free home make sure to schedule a routine rodent control service once every 3 to 4 months. You can learn more about rodents, rodent control and explore regulations at the United States EPA’s website on controlling rodents.
