During the winter, mice and rats will look for a warm place to wait it out and once rodents start to consider your home theirs, they can be hard to get rid of.
While you might feel sorry for them and sympathise with their search for a warm home for themselves and their families, mice and rats can cause serious problems. They can chew through wires, damage walls and woodwork and leave droppings and urine behind, which can be a health hazard as well as smelly.
Here’s how to get rid of rodents and keep them at bay.
Find out where they’re living
Mice and rats are creatures of habit. They’ll hide during the day and follow the same trails around your home at night, so sprinkle flour on your kitchen floor and look out for footprints and trails in the morning. When you see where they’re living, you can concentrate your efforts in the right place.
Locate and fill in holes in walls and cupboards
This is more preventative than anything, especially when it comes to external walls. However, blocking access to food cupboards makes your kitchen less attractive to guests and may see them move on elsewhere.
Always seal up food, even dry goods, in sturdy containers and tins
It’s also important to clean up your kitchen surfaces before you go to bed, as even a few crumbs or smears of butter will attract rodents. Similarly, clean up pet food bowls at night too.
Make sure your outdoor bins are secure
If your bins fall over or have wonky lids, mice, rats and even foxes will make a beeline for them.
Remove or fill in any cavities in your property
A hollow wall, an empty cupboard or a loose floorboard will provide a safe nesting area for rodents, to block, seal and fill anything that might look like a des res.
Set traps if you have a recurring problem
There are humane traps on the market, as well as devices that create high-pitched noises to deter rodents from settling.
Introduce some feline pest-control
Buy a cat – or borrow one for a couple of weeks – to reduce the population and scare off any tiny would-be tenants. Sometimes the old-fashioned solutions are the best, and you don’t have to lift a finger yourself!
