Rats are more than just a nuisance and an eye sore. They can also be very serious pests that pose a threat to your home. In this article, we’re going to cover the damage that rats can cause.
Home damage
Many homeowners don’t know that a rat infestation can lead to some costly damage in the home. To start, rats will tear out the insulation out of the walls in order to use it for their nest. This can lead to a reduction in the energy efficiency of the building and higher heating/cooling costs. Rats also have the tendency to gnaw on electrical wiring, and strip its insulation. This can kill the rat inside the wall, lead to power outages, and create an electrical fire hazard in the building.
Diseases
The most dangerous aspect of a rat infestation is the diseases that they can spread. Rats are rife with pathogens and they have more than one way to spread them. Over 20 different diseases can be spread through direct contact, bites, droppings and urine. On top of that, rats can have parasites such as fleas, bed bugs and ticks, which can spread diseases from the rats to people, and carry a few diseases of their own. To list some of these diseases out, you have Lyme, rat-bite fever, salmonellosis, and even the plague. So getting the rats out of the home as soon as possible is crucial.
Control
Given the amount of damage and the threat that they pose to the health of the inhabitants of a building, rats have to be detected and removed early. To detect an infestation keep an eye out around the home for rat droppings, gnaw marks, and visible trails on the bottom of the walls and on the floor. These are usually the common signs that will give a rat infestation away. Once you spot them, get in touch with a pest control pro asap.
A pro will employ traps and poisons to get rid of the infestation, depending on its size. While this may seem like something that can be implemented DIY, rats are very hard to remove, because they will often evade control efforts, and if an infestation is not removed fully, then the rats will simply repopulate.
For more information about rats and how they are controlled, or if you have an infestation that has to be removed, contact us today.
