Maidenhead Pest Control - professional, local rat control across Wargrave

Why are rats such a big problem in Wargrave?

The answer to that is many fold but its easy to see how an adaptable, clever and opportunistic animal like the rat can thrive; the reason that rats are a problem in Wargrave are down to the following main reasons -

Population

Rats live around humans and as our communities grow in number so do the rats, the rats that we see in Wargrave are omnivores and they will hunt for prey animals such as smaller rodents – mice and shrews and insects.

Their main source of food will be from the table of man and accordingly they are termed commensal rodents, commensal referring to meaning “Eating together at the same table”.

The greater the population, the greater the waste and a higher proportion of things like, bird feeding and keeping chickens all means that rats have a wider range of potential food sources and therefore more breeding opportunities.

Environment

Wargrave is a small town situated on the bank of the River Thames and there is not a lot around the town for rats apart from farmland; in general the rats will have a migratory pattern in and out of the town following the seasons – spring see’s movement away back into the hedgerows and fields where food is appearing and the onset of winter see’s their return.

This is quite a loose definition as many rats will find adequate sources of food within the town that are stable all year long – the over filled bird feeder is just one example.

We cannot ignore the fact that in times of flooding, rats will get washed down the length of the Thames and this will impact on the local rodent population.

Construction

Sadly we see what is largely a Victorian town, slowly being extended and converted using modern building methods and materials; for example the Victorians’ used cast iron and ceramic in the construction of air bricks.

Its now the 21st Century and in our wisdom we use plastic one’s, as rats have teeth that are as hard as cast iron, you can see how easy it is for rats to gnaw their way into the cavity on the other side.

Another big issue that we’re seeing is the use of flexi-connectors to join the toilet to the waste outlet. These flexi-connectors are used in modern, boxed in toilet cisterns and the rats can gnaw through the sides of these connectors within seconds.

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Maidenhead Pest Control for permanent rat eradication in Wargrave

How do we know if we have a rat problem?

Noises in the dead of night are usually attributed to rats; mice and squirrels and even the edible dormouse, Glis glis move around at night and can make a lot of noise especially when running across bare plasterboard.

If you think that you’ve got rats in Wargrave one sure sign is the smell of urine; rats urinate where they travel to denote its their territory and the area is safe to travel. Void areas like the space below floorboards, some electrical cupboards and the loft may have a smell of stale urine, mice and squirrels will do the same but the quantities are different for mice and with squirrels they will often urinate outside or in one small area.

Another sign to be on the lookout for are droppings; rats deposit over forty fecal offerings a day and these will be found in runs or in corners. Rat droppings are similar to those of squirrels: the difference is in the smell and I’ll leave that up to you to find out. Rat droppings are black and elongated with rounded ends – think of a licorice torpedo if your of that age or bigger but similar in shape to long grain rice if that just went over your head.

Smear marks from the rats dirty fur can be seen where they repeatedly rub over something in their travels; this takes a little time to build up and if we see this either the infestation is bigger than we thought or its gone on longer than you thought.

Finally look for signs of damage: gnawed food containers like cardboard boxes, teeth marks on plastic and holes bitten through kitchen plinths and around pipe holes; if you look closely you can often see the teeth marks which is an aid to determining whether it’s a rat or a mouse.

Low cost professional rat catching in Wargrave

Why are rats inside our homes?

Food and shelter, they will find small items that drop down the side of kitchen units and they will get into areas where food is stored in bulk. Once they have a stable food source they may start breeding and we will see young rats right through the year, the other thing our homes offer the rat is shelter. As they are warm blooded, they need to keep warm through the winter and so its more energy efficient to move in with us and relay on your home to provide the warmth.

How do the rats get into our home?

At the beginning we said that rats were adaptable, clever and opportunistic well they are also equipped with some remarkable skills that help them get into our houses and business premises. Rats are able swimmers using their powerful back legs to propel them through the water, in addition, the rat will swish its tail from side to side providing extra power.

Rats can even tread water for over three days without stopping, this means that one access point exploited by the rat is the drainage system. If your home is on mains drainage then you have the risk that rats can come up under the property using any breakage or joint slippage to get into the void that surrounds the pipe work – don’t forget that rats can even swim up through the toilet ‘S’ bend!

Broken air bricks, rotten door frames, joint weeps and poor building work all allow rats to get through the walls and access the interior; modern houses have cavity walls and once any rodent gets through the outer wall, the loft is just a few metres away.

Roofline is the least encountered but still considered and we see a small but frequent percentage of internal rat infestations caused by rats climbing up and entering through the roof. Rats are excellent jumpers and can easily travel over 1.2 metres horizontally or almost a metre straight up from a standing start.

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How can we stop rats from getting into our home?

Our approach to all forms of rodent control in Wargrave is based on the principals of Integrated Pest Management – we differ from many other pest control companies in that our approach is to use poison as a last resort and we start our rat treatments in Wargrave with a thorough inspection and site survey.

We look for the rats entry point and that means before we do anything we survey and track the possible routes into the interior; with suspected drainage defects we will use a CCTV camera to look up the drain to determine where the fault lies.

Drain defects can run into thousands of pounds and require the use of experienced contractors; if defects exist in the walls of the inspection pit we can make good the repairs, likewise we repair, cover and seal any entrance points around the property that we find on our inspection.

Our aim is to totally resolve your rat problem for good, and not just throw some rodenticide around hoping to get the job done, when you choose Maidenhead Pest Control to get rid of your rats – we do just that!

Total rat control from Maidenhead Pest Control for Wargrave and Sonning

Call Maidenhead Pest Control for a professional solution to your rat problem.

Click this link to our main website page on rats.

Here at Maidenhead Pest Control we can provide a post infestation cleaning and rubbish removal service if that is something that you require, we are licensed waste carriers and we can remove contaminated loft insulation, rubbish that has had rats or mice on it and we also take down and remove old rotten sheds that may have harboured rats in the garden. All our waste is taken to an approved waste transfer station and we can produce the paperwork to show that this has been treated responsibly.