Mice and rats are among the most common and most feared home invaders. Once they’ve established a foothold in your structure they can be very difficult to eradicate as they breed very quickly and quickly adapt to common extermination techniques. In the past, technicians have had to rely a range of extremely inhumane and largely ineffective systems to attempt to get control of rodent populations, these systems have included poison bait, sticky traps, snap traps and countless other devices that generally attack one rodent at a time. There are several problems with this approach.
Poison spreads far beyond it’s intended targets, especially with rodents. Mice and rats ingest the poison and run outside of the structure in search of water, where they are eaten by pet cats and dogs. In more remote areas the poison spreads to the nearby wildlife and can often go up a long chain of predators as each animal in turn sickens, dies and is scavenged. In addition, rodents learn quickly and will often start avoiding poison baits nearly immediately. Snap traps and sticky traps are fine for catching individual rodents, but totally ineffective at managing and reducing a large population.
Another factor is the cruelty of these methods. Researchers at the Max Planck Institute of Neurobiology have confirmed that mice have a range of facial expressions to show familiar human emotions like pleasure, disgust, nausea, pain, and fear. You can ask anyone who has ever had a pet rodent, be it a mouse, a rat or a guinea pig, and they can tell you that rodents are highly intelligent, natural students who excel at learning and understanding concepts.
It is our opinion that rodent populations can and should be managed humanely, without risk of poisoning the environment or a neighbor’s beloved pet. Our three-fold treatment plan is more effective than poison or traps and provides a long lasting solution to a rodent problem, and that plan consists of exclusion, resource deprivation and contraception.
First, we practice exclusion. This process involves a thorough inspection of the infested structure to identify and remedy access points being used by rodents. When possible we will close off the access ourselves, and we’ll identify the problem areas for you if more extensive construction or carpentry is necessary to fix the problem. In most cases, rodents are using a food or water source somewhere in the structure, and it’s very important to either remove that resource or rodent proof the area in cases where that isn’t possible. Lastly, we employ a professional-grade reproductive inhibitor and highly palatable contraceptive for rats, deployed in bait stations that are regularly monitored to ensure uptake by the local rodent population.
These contraceptive products are fairly new to the market but have been shown to be highly effective at reducing rodent populations. When used together with exclusion and resource deprivation, long term eradication is possible. Our products are more humane AND more effective more traditional methods and can be deployed quickly to get rats and mice under control.