Serving Bristol Tn., Bristol Va., Kingsport, Johnson City, Abingdon, Elizabethton, and the surrounding areas.

HOW EXPENSIVE IS IT TO REMOVE RATS?

This is a follow along on a rat inspection in Abingdon Virginia. Rat populations were high here and the rats had penetrated the flexible ductwork under the home. The homeowner realized that something was wrong when she could smell urine coming from the AC register.

I have seen some really crazy rat situations. If conditions are right, there can be dozens, if not hundreds of rats running through a building (dozens is more the norm). I have been in the middle of conversations with customers on the first visit and watched rats darting around me. One customer had to shoo them away just so she could feed her livestock. She was starting to see them in her home as well. I hear all kinds of crazy stories too. One couple woke up in the middle of the night to see one standing up silhouetted in the doorway of their bedroom. Rats become much more brazen when they reach high numbers and are easier to hear and see at night. Populations can grow rapidly if food sources are available. Part of our services includes helping customers develop long-term food and water source-control plans. This can go a long way toward controlling future outbreaks.

The long-term elimination of rats is accomplished by sealing buildings to keep rats out and eliminating them from the premises through trapping. The cost of long-term rat removal is variable and depends on three factors:

1. Long-term rat removal depends on the number and nature of entrances to be sealed. Decayed or poorly installed house materials increase cost as will larger numbers of entrances to be dealt with.

2. Long-term rat removal depends on the number of rats that must be removed. Larger numbers of rats will require longer to trap and more trap visits.

3. Long-term rat removal depends on the experience level of rats can greatly increase the length of the trapping program. Large number of rats that have already had a “bad trap experiences” either personally or secondhand when a trap killed a nearby rat will be much more cautious and can greatly increase the length of the trapping program. This is a phenomenon that commonly accompanies trapping larger number of individuals of highly intelligent species from a single site.

A simple two visit (set up and pick up) trapping program without exclusion starts at about $150 and goes up with the degree of difficulty. Average-sized homes with average to severe outbreaks and an average number of entrances can cost around $700. Our rat projects are more expensive because we actually kill all the rats. At high population levels, rats are easy to spot and hear at night. The problem is that rats are really smart and when populations start to dwindle, they become much more cautious. Four or five rats can live in a home for weeks unnoticed. All species have their “special skill” and sneakiness is a rats “special skill”. Being able to detect the presence of a rat is key to success and over time I have developed my own system that lets me know whether or not there are rats in the home. It takes a lot more time and work to kill all the rats than it does to kill some of the rats.

This is much more than what you would spend with the average pest control company, but it is well worth the cost. Pesticides are far from guaranteed to remove all the rats and don’t keep the rats from showing up again. At best they depress populations to the point that they are not visible. I had a customer near Science Hill High School in Johnson City who had a full set of bait boxes set with poison that had been in place plenty of time to kill her rats. I killed five rats before we finished.

Wildlife Control companies like the Wildlife Company are able to actually eliminate the rats and to verify that they are gone. Pest control companies charge less to get set up but keep you on the hook permanently. In the end you waste a lot of money with the endless poison box. Who wants to keep boxes of poison around the house forever? Give us a call and let us fix your problem.