Hennepin County, Minneapolis Rat Control Situation:
Hi, David, Thank you very much to establish your very educational and candid website. I bought a house half a year ago and it had rats in the attic and in the crawl space. I hired a rodent removal guy to take care of the problem. I spent almost $1000 but I still had rats - he didn't seal all the entry points. Anyway, I then did a lot of research in rats. lol. According to my rodent guy, there was about 10 rats living in my attic. But his trap caught none after sealing all the holes (He thought he did but there was two crawl space vent open). He then claimed that all rats gone because they are "scared". Later I set traps myself and I caught two large roof rats (really large, almost 12 oz each I would say). After that, no more caught. In October, I hired an insulation company to remove ALL the batt insulation from my attic. There was still thousands of droppings left on the joist bays. I painstakingly vaccuum them out (me wearing face masks). Now the attic is clean. However, I could not find ANY gnaw marks on wood, nor electric wires, nor on anything else. Why is that? How could it be? This house had tens of thousands of rat droppings in the attic, thousands of droppings in the garage and thousands in the crawl space. But I am not able to spot their damage other than the droppings? I thought rats have to chew on stuffs to keep their teeth from growing too long. I hope you could help answer this question. It always bugs me if there is something unexplainable. Thanks! Guangchi from Minneapolis Area
Minneapolis Rat Control Tip of The Week
Ways To Get Rats Out Of My Garage
Clean Your Garage Out:
Before you begin setting down traps to work on removing rats from the area, you need to eliminate places where they can hide. Store trash and other items outside of your garage. Clean out your garage to make sure that there is no need for a competing food source or a problem with rats hiding in enclosed containers.
Setting Traps:
Setting down traps and using various methods for getting rid of rats is the next step. You can consider items like glue traps, snap traps, and certain types of poison. Rats can easily track poison around a garage so it can be important to keep your pets out of the area whenever possible.
Seal Up Areas Of Your Garage:
If rats have the chance to get into your garage, this could mean that their numbers will grow. Sealing up the ceiling and looking for signs where rats can get in can be important.
Disposal:
Making sure that you dispose of materials where rats have been can be important. Get rid of nest materials and make sure that you remove any of the rat carcasses from your garage as these can start to smell and cause other issues. Proper disposal can be a solution that will help you to remove the rats from your home and make sure they do not return.
Use Bleach:
Rats have a great sense of smell and they will often avoid areas that have been cleaned or bleached. If you have an area that has been bleached, that will often prevent rats from making their way into your garage and avoiding the area.