The Rat Race

Pest rodents are the fourth-ranked top pest by volume of work, so why are rats and mice still such a focus of effort?

Enough bait and traps have been sold in the past decade alone to kill millions of these pests, and no secrets exist in the life cycles of these animals, or in understanding their simple requirements for food and shelter.

In addition, the basics of improved sanitation and rodent-proofing to limit infestations are well understood. Yet frequent news reports and individual observations suggest that commensal rodent problems are as bad as ever in many cases, particularly in our cities.

There are a number of issues at stake which have allowed rodents to prosper within our neighbourhoods:

• Many people with rodent problems are simply not prepared to pay for the level of effort required to solve the problems when they finally become serious enough for them to truly take notice. In fact, it often would have been far cheaper to practice prevention.
• Most pest rodents are tackled in isolation at the individual customer level.
• Control efforts all too often are sporadic and insufficient to prevent reinfestation.
• Most importantly, too much reliance is placed in rodent control (as with bait and traps) and not enough on rodent prevention techniques and environmental improvement.

To solve the problem of a rat or mouse infestation, a true integrated pest management rodent program is needed - a solution which provides more than simply trapping and bait-station replenishment.

In addition to standard pest control techniques, an integrated solution is also comprised of surveys and the monitoring of conditions for both residential and commercial customers, enabling rapid identification of problem areas within your property.

Article provided by Dynamic Pest Control