Out of Your Home
Out of Your Home
Snap traps
Tom Cat Rat Traps, Tom Cat Mouse Traps, Victor Rat Traps, Victor Mouse Traps
Electrocution traps
Rat Zapper, Raticator Plus Rodent Trap, Victor Electronic Mouse Trap, Victor Electronic Rat Trap
There are plenty of reasons why it’s important to keep rodents out of and away from your home. Rats and mice can bring fleas, ticks, and germs that carry diseases. Rodents and their droppings can make allergies and asthma worse. Rats and mice will eat and contaminate your food, damage property, and can even cause fires by chewing on electrical wires in your walls or attic.
How do you know whether you have a rodent problem? You may see a mouse or rat, smell them, or hear them chewing and scampering at night in walls and ceilings. Look for droppings, signs of gnawing, and the nests rats and mice make from shredded paper, cloth, or insulation. You may find rat burrows in the ground outside.
Trapping alone will not solve your rat or mouse problem long-term. You must also take steps to keep other rats or mice from getting into your home.
Since a mouse can squeeze through a hole as thin as a pencil, and both rats and mice can chew a small hole into a larger one, be sure to seal or close off all cracks and crevices.
Call a pest management professional (PMP) that offers less-toxic solutions to all pest problems (integrated pest management, or IPM).
For a listing of pest control companies providing IPM services, go to www.ecowisecertified.org or www.greenshieldcertified.org.
Electrocution traps are effective—and more humane than snap traps. These battery-operated traps (not to be confused with ultrasonic devices) ensure that rodents die quickly and also make getting rid of dead animals easier.
Snap traps come in different sizes for rats and mice. Use a trap rated for rats for roof rats (which sometimes are mistaken for mice, as they are grey and “cuter” than Norway rats). A too-small trap may only wound the animal. Always keep snap traps out of the reach of children and pets.
Mice are easy to trap using peanut butter as bait. Trapping rats takes more patience.
If you don’t succeed, you may need to hire a pest management professional.
Common home and garden pesticides are found in stormwater runoff, treated wastewater, and in local waterways, sometimes at levels that can harm sensitive aquatic life. Our Water Our World, sponsor of this website, is a joint effort by water pollution prevention agencies, participating retail stores, and pesticide distributors and manufacturers — working together to reduce the risks associated with pesticide use.
This website is provided as a public service. No endorsement of specific brand name products is intended, nor is criticism implied of similar products that are not mentioned.