Being nocturnal creatures, mice prefer to keep hidden and quiet during the day and they tend to head out and search for food in the middle of the night. Still, there are quite a few signs that you may have a mouse infestation.
Mice are active all year long and they can cause a great deal of damage should they find their way into your home. If they go undetected, they could start chewing on wires and spreading dangerous germs all over your house.
Maybe you have been there before. You are all curled up on the couch with a bowl of popcorn, a warm blanket and a great movie, when you all of the sudden hear a funny noise. You aren’t sure where it came from, it could have been coming from inside the walls.
If you have been hearing strange noises coming from the walls, you might want to investigate a bit further. Earthwise Pest Management, your rodent control company in Sacramento, offers the signs you have mice in your home.
Pet Behavior
Your dog might start acting weird and barking at the walls if you have mice in your house. Fido can hear better than you and smell better than you, so use your dog as a tool to help discover the infestation.
If you have a cat, it is likely it will know if you have a mice issue way before you do. In fact, your cat is just as eager as you are wanting to find the mice.
Signs of Gnawing
The teeth that mice have never stop growing. Due to this fact, mice must chew on things to keep them ground down. Since mice aren’t picky about what they chew on, you could see damage to power cords, cardboard boxes and furniture.
So if you think you might have mice, be on the lookout for chewed up objects. Mice are always looking for food and water, so check for signs of chewing in the kitchen and bathrooms.
Grease Marks
Mice have grease in their fur that will leave marks on objects they rub up against. Check the walls and siding for grease marks. These are discolored areas that are attributed to rodent rubbing.
Droppings
In all likelihood, you will smell mouse droppings before you actually see them. But you might be in your kitchen searching for your favorite saute pan in the cabinet when you come across droppings.
Droppings are both a sign of an infestation and a safety hazard, so be careful.
Droppings look like small grains of rice, but vary in size based on the species you have in your house.
Destroyed Food Packaging
If you find that the box of cookies you bought has been chewed up, think twice before blaming the dog. Mice get hungry and need to eat. They are suckers for easy pickings, which means they will gnaw through packaging to get to the food.
They have very sharp teeth and they have powerful jaws, you might not think that such a small creature could do so much damage to a box of cereal.
Odor
One of the first signs that you might have mice is the musky odor. When mice invade your home, they leave a mess in their wake. They leave droppings everywhere, they chew things up and leave a general mess. They are as bad as teenage boys, and they smell as well.
Worse still, when a mouse is ready to die, they will retreat to a corner of your house to die alone. Homes that are suffering an infestation often have a heavy, pungent, musky smell to them.
If you think you have an infestation, give Earthwise Pest Management a call.