Rodents can be a major problem in the home and may also be difficult to eliminate. Rats and mice seek food, shelter, and warmth in your home, yet they can also bring in dangerous diseases. One of the biggest threats from rodents in the home comes via their tendency to be destructive. They chew through electrical cables with surprising frequency, and this can be a fire risk.

You may want to talk to a professional pest control company such as majesticpestcontrol.com for advice on keeping pests out of your home and possibly for help with extermination. But first, check the following list of tips for rodent control in the home.

Keep Your Home Tidy and Clean

It’s not only rodents that you may have to deal with in your home but other pests such as cockroaches and bed bugs. Each of these seeks the shelter they are looking for, and the food, and a clean and tidy house – one where waste is disposed of quickly and properly – is not the sort of home that will appeal to rats and mice. They need access to food, which brings us to one of the most important preventative measures of all.

Never Leave Food Out

Food left uncovered anywhere in the home is a major attraction to rats and mice, let alone to cockroaches. Whether it’s someone who has a habit of putting a plate with leftovers on I down and forgetting about it or leaving food for people to take when they want it, it’s a definite no when you are worried about mice and rats.

Dispose of leftovers in a sealed outdoor bin, and store fresh food in sealed containers. Rodents will easily get into plastic bags, so you need solid food containers and a secure cupboard. Don’t put scraps out for the birds as rats do not discriminate!

Make sure plates with residue on are washed immediately or put in the dishwasher, as your rodent guests will try anything for a feed. It’s simple to get into a routine where anti-pest measures and removing rats and mice from homes become part of your mealtime.  Additionally, dog owners must be cautious since many rodents consuming dogs are at a high risk of intestinal worm infections and secondary rat bait poisoning.

Keep Your Yard and Garden Tended

The simple fact is that rats and mice come in from outdoors, so to get to your home, they need to use your yard. Keeping a lawn trimmed short means fewer hiding spaces for rodents. Make sure weeds are dealt with. Any scrap or other material lying about makes a great home for rodents. If you have a vehicle rotting away in your yard, get rid of it. Wood stores should be off the ground or in sealed boxes.

Basically, you’re looking to remove anything that would serve as an appropriate shelter for a rodent. This means anywhere with cover from the elements and a place to hide. One further tip is to plant species that pests don’t like. Spearmint, for example, helps keep rats and mice away.

Do Your Laundry Regularly

Mice can be especially difficult to find in the home, as some species are extremely small. They may, in fact, nest in your soft furnishings, so you need to launder any bedclothes, throws, and other items that may be hiding a mouse nest regularly and thoroughly. This is also a good method of protecting against another common pest, bed bugs, which live in your soft furnishings, clothes, and luggage coming from abroad. We also need to talk about how rodents get into your home as well as why, so let’s have a brief look at the various potential points of entry.

Seal Points of Entry

Mice can squeeze through gaps so small you may not believe it. Rats can also get through gaps that defy their size. You’re looking for any point of entry that a rodent may look for and use to get into your home. These include the following:

• Tiny cracks in woodwork and brickwork that are, in fact, big enough for a mouse to get through.
• Entrance doors left open are a simple invitation to rodents. Make sure you have a screen on doors left open for comfort, and this will also help keep out mosquitos and other flying insects.
• Air bricks are a mouse’s friend, but not when they are covered with fine wire mesh that makes the holes impenetrable.
• In older houses especially look for gaps around the basement that you can see outside through; if you can see daylight, it’s a suitable rodent entrance.

These are just some of the potential entrance points for rodents into your home, and while it may not be possible to find and fill every single tiny crack. Dealing with those you are aware of by filling with a hard substance goes some way to acting as a deterrent to rodents.

Get a Cat!

If you happen to like cats, they make wonderful companions in the home. They are also good at catching mice and perhaps rats. However, the sight of dead mice all over the home is not one you want to see but is one that will become regular if you decide to install a feline friend to help with rodent control.

This is often the case in remote or rural homes where the cat can take its dead prey outdoors and therefore deal with it as nature would. Cats do need maintenance, so this is a measure you must only take should you have the time to care for your new pet.

Conclusion

We have listed the most effective methods of DIY rodent control, and when you read through, you’ll see that a lot of it is about making your home less attractive to household pests in general. The important recap here is about waste food and its disposal: food is the main reason all pests invade your home, so should there be no access to food in your house, then the rodents will seek it elsewhere.

We hope we’ve helped you with our rodent control and prevention tips and that you get things under control quickly.

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