Roseville is a gorgeous community, known for its beautiful homes, bustling workforce, and great shopping opportunities. There’s a lot that residents can enjoy about living in Roseville. Unfortunately, it also isn’t uncommon for residents to find that they’ve come across problems with rodents in their home. It’s not fun to find out that you have unwanted guests in your home, especially ones that can cause as many problems as rodents can. Aside from spreading disease, rodents can contaminate food supplies and cause expensive structural damage to homes, as well as make noise at night and be a startling presence. Fortunately, there are some steps you can take to stop rodents from entering your Roseville home, and if you need help, we’re always here to help.
Types of Rodents Common in Roseville, CA
Unfortunately for residents of Roseville, it’s not uncommon to see a few different types of rodents in homes. The most common of them are Roof Rats and Norway Rats, along with House Mice. All three can pose their own problems for residents, and we’ll get into a little bit about them, how to recognize them, and some of their habits.
Roof Rats
Roof Rats are often seen in Roseville. As their name suggests, they do indeed have an affinity for roofs, and they’re often seen traversing heights along tree branches, roofs, and even power lines. Roof rats are recognizable with very long tails and they can be brown or black. Like many rodents, they’re quite a bit more active when it starts to get dark out, and they can make some noise at night. They often make themselves at home in higher places, preferring to nest in places like attics when they’ve made their way into homes.
Norway Rats
Norway rats also aren’t uncommon to see in Roseville. They’re a little bit larger than roof rats, and they don’t like heights as much. Accordingly, they’re less adept climbers, and they tend to nest a little bit lower than their roof-oriented counterparts, and they’re known to live in burrows underground, and in lower enclosed spaces when they’ve made themselves at home indoors. They’re also less slender, and have shorter tails. They range in color from gray to brown.
House Mice
Residents of Roseville also might come across House Mice. Much smaller than Norway or Roof Rats, they can be recognized by their much smaller size, and often lighter colored hair.
Evidence of Rodents In Your Roseville Home
There are some signs to look out for that rodents have made their way into your Roseville home. While it’s less common to actually come across rodents due to their nature, size, and the fact that they’re mostly active in later hours when we’re often asleep, there are other signs that might indicate that you’re dealing with an infestation of rodents.
Droppings
Finding rodent droppings is one of the most common signs of rodent infestation. You’ll likely see these around places where food is stored, and in tight spaces. Droppings will also give you a clue as to what type of rodent you might be dealing with. House Mice droppings tend to be much smaller than those of Roof or Norway rats. While rat droppings are comparable to the size of a small raisin, mouse droppings are generally much smaller.
Finding Chew Marks
Both mice and rats are avid chewers. They’ll gnaw their way into just about anything they can, including walls, food containers, wiring, and paper. If you’re finding things chewed up in your home, it can be a sign of a rodent infestation. You also may find containers of food with holes chewed through them.
Shredded Nesting Materials
Mice and rats will find soft materials like paper, fabric, cardboard, and even insulation and shred them to make their nests out of. If you find scraps of shredded soft materials around your home, this can be a sign of nesting rodents.
Hearing Noises At Night
You might hear noises that sound like scratching and tapping at night, and those can indicate the presence of rodents. Rodents are often active at night, and they’ll make noise chewing and running about, even in walls and in the ceiling. This can be a telltale sign of an infestation.
Eaten Snail Shells
This one particularly pertains to Roof Rats, who will leave behind eaten snail shells. These can be a telltale sign of Roof Rats living in or around your home.
Ways Rodents Can Get In To Roseville Homes
There are some common ways that rodents make their way into homes. Since even Norway rats, the largest rodents we’ve discussed, are quite small, they can easily make their way into your home through even very small spaces. One thing people often don’t realize is how flexible these rodents are. Rats and mice can squeeze their bodies through holes that appear smaller than they are. If their head can fit, they can manage to wriggle the rest of their body through.
Roof Rats
Roof Rats, as their name implies, have an affinity for roofs. They can make their way to roofs from tree limbs adjacent to homes and make their way inside from there. Through roofs, especially tile roofs, Roof Rats can find gaps and crevices that allow them access to attics, where they’ll happily begin building a nest.
Norway Rats
Though Norway Rats don’t like to climb as much as Roof Rats, they can find other ways to get inside. They’re known to make burrows near homes, and make their way inside from there. They can squeeze through even very small cracks and crevices. Even the gaps underneath doors are often large enough for rats to squeeze their way through. They can also get through cracks in walls, and almost anywhere else there’s enough space for them to wriggle through.
House Mice
The smallest of the three we’ve discussed, House Mice can get in through extremely small spaces. They’re also adept climbers, so they aren’t limited to ground level entrances. House mice will find cracks or crevices in walls, make their way underneath doors—especially large garage doors, through roofs and attics, and even through foundations. And once they’re inside, they can make their nests in very small spaces.
Keeping Rodents Out of Your Roseville Home
Rodents can pose some serious risks to residents, and chances are you don’t love to see unwanted rodents in your home. Luckily, there are some ways you can minimize the risk of rodents making their way inside, and some ways you can create an environment in and around your home less conducive to their presence in the first place.
Limit Ways For Them To Get In
As we’ve discussed, rodents can make their way into your home through a wide range of entry points, from foundation to roof. This can be one of the most challenging parts of keeping rodents out, and involves sealing up your home from top to bottom. This will include ensuring that even small cracks are sealed around your foundation, underneath doors and windows, on walls, around the perimeter of your garage, and anywhere else rodents can squeeze through.
It might involve installing weather stripping on doors and applying sealant around doors and windows and in cracks in walls, and cutting back limbs that are too close to your roof or walls, and even sealing up roofing where Roof Rats can make their way through. This can be a particularly laborious process for residents, and at Earthwise, we can help you get the job done right.
Make an Environment Less Conducive
Another step you can take is limiting the amount of attractions around your home to rodents. This might involve tipping out standing water, ensuring that there aren’t low lying shrubs or bushes directly next to your walls, moving storage piles, securing pet food outdoors, keeping trash cans secured, and ensuring that any fruit or produce dropped by trees or plants is picked up off the ground regularly.
Call The Pros at Earthwise
You might have taken all of these steps, and you’re still finding signs of rodents, or maybe you need some help getting your home safe from rodents, and either way, at Earthwise we can help.
Inspection
The first step we take, and arguably the most important, is a thorough inspection. We’ll look for signs of rodents, conditions that can attract them, and locations where they can make their way in. We’ll cover every minute detail to make sure we haven’t missed anything, and provide you with a full report of our findings. This step is important because it will inform the steps we take next, and what recommendations we provide you with.
Trapping
Next, we’ll begin the process of trapping rodents. Not only will this help cut down an infestation, but by trapping them, we can know without any doubt exactly which type of rodents you may be dealing with.
Exclusion
This is the process of sealing up your home from future rodents making their way in. This is one of the hardest parts of dealing with rodent infestations, and we’ll take a thorough and comprehensive approach. This involves sealing up your home from top to bottom, and a solid understanding of the rodents you’re dealing with—their biology and behavior. That’s why the inspection stage is so crucial to the process, and makes us so successful.
Follow Up and Regular Inspection
The final step is follow ups and regular inspections. This way, we can ensure that your home stays safe, and that we’ve made sure your rodent problem is taken care of. As always, if we have to come back because you’re still dealing with rodents after our service, our next visit will be free.
Don’t Hesitate to Reach Out
Whether you’ve already seen all the signs of a rodent infestation, or you just want to make sure that your home stays safe year-round, don’t hesitate to reach out and give us a call or contact us online. You can reach out online 24/7 here, or call us at (916) 668-8888, and we’ll provide you with a quick and free quote.