Hamilton County, Chattanooga Rat Control Situation:
Hi David, I hope this email finds you doing well. I am really hoping you can help me... We have a dead rat in our attic. My husband works from home, and when he walked into the den (next to our bedroom) he smelled the odor. Because he works from home, he'll be smelling this odor until it goes away. I keep calling several numbers but I don't get someone on the other end and I haven't received any call backs. Is there anyone you can recommend in Chattanooga TN??? Please help! Any suggestion are welcome. Any way we can disguise the odor in the meantime or perhaps make it a bit more tolerable given my husband works from there? Many thanks in advance!
We purchased a new 2014 Ford Edge Limited with all the bells and whistles about 4 months ago. My with drives like a road warrior as she just had the 20000 mile checkup completed about two weeks ago and no rats. Tuesday morning she started the car and all the lights and warning lights stayed on so she took it to the Ford dealer in Temple, Texas where she was working. The service tech opened the hood and said they would take it back and check. When the mechanic started moving stuff out came a Hugh rat about 8" long (including tail). The damage was extensive to wiring harnesses. He told my wife they get about 4 of the per month on the new cars now! Apparently some idiot tree hugger decided to use "Soy" based wiring instead of rubber or poly as insulation in all the new cars! Rats love it! He said the rats was probably only there a few days and maybe only one night ! $1200 to fix this damage but if the rats show back up it could continue to cost more. The insurance we have covers this damage with a $250 deductible. My question is how do we prevent this from happening again? This is apparently a big problem on all new cars made in the USA. Feeling lost without a solution.
Chattanooga Rat Control Tip of The Week
Can A Rat Have Rabies?
Rats have powerful bites:
Rats can have very powerful bites and are capable of damaging the skin quickly. A rat can bite through cinderblocks to get into an area if it needs to. Rats could bite through clothing or manage to break the skin even unintentionally with a very quick bite. Handling rats with care or using heavy gloves is recommended if you have to remove one or relocate it. It is ultimately best if you avoid handling rats whenever possible.
Many people are bitten each year with low rates of infection:
Rats bite over 50,000 people in the USA each year. Rabies vaccine shots are very rarely delivered in these cases and the risk for other types of diseases that rats carry can be far greater. Going to see a doctor about a rat bite can be wise if you are starting to feel some of the secondary symptoms or it looks infected.
Rats do spread disease:
Rats do spread a series of diseases including rat-bite fever. It can be transmitted through a bite or through pets. Rabies can be a deadly disease but most of the diseases that rats pass on are only able to cause the chance for fever and infection which carry lower rates of mortality.
Other animals can be much riskier to receive bites from:
If you are bitten by other animals like raccoons, coyotes, woodchucks, or skunks, this will give you a much riskier chance of receiving something like rabies. When bitten by a rat, you should be concerned but you may not have to run to get the bite checked out with the same urgency.
The main theory of low rabies cases:
A rat would have to survive a bite from a predator in order to become a carrier of rabies. As coyotes and larger animals will be likely to kill a rat in an attack, this leads to the chance of rats not being able to spread rabies at all.