Rodent control

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One of the worst pest problems a household can experience has to be an infestation of mice or other rodents. You’ve likely had at least one encounter with these pests, and maybe even set traps or put out poison. But the chances are good that you’re not done yet. Beyond the “ick” factor, there is real reason to take every precaution with these pests and give us a call instead.

Call Sprayed Pest Control 

In Australia we have two species of rat that can be considered truly commensal - a species that lives off the resources provided by us.

The black rat (Rattus rattus), or ship rat, is the species of rat that people will most often encounter in their houses in Australia. Then there is the brown rat (Rattus norvegicus), also known as the Norway rat (although it doesn’t come from Norway). This is the species that is often kept as pets and used in lab research.

In the northern hemisphere, the much larger brown rats seem to outcompete black rats. But in Australia and New Zealand, black rats are more widespread and common than brown rats, for reasons we don’t fully understand.

Australia also has approximately 60 known species of native rodents, including eight species of native Rattus that evolved from from ancestors which arrived about a million years ago. Similar in size to black rats, these native rats have probably prevented the spread of black rats into natural areas, as has happened in New Zealand and Pacific islands which lack native rodents.

It can be hard to tell a black rat from a native bush rat (Rattus fuscipes), but black rats are more slender with longer tails, and bush rats are chubbier. It is easier to pick a brown rat, which is more than twice the size of a black rat.

Native bush rats are chubbier than their introduced relatives. Peter Banks, Author provided

The first black rat specimens collected in Sydney were mistaken for native rats.

The black rat is now one of the most widely distributed animals in the world, perhaps only surpassed by humans and house mice. The live on every continent except Antarctica.

What brings them to our houses? The houses we live in provide rats with the secure, thermally stable homes they need to breed in. They eat a vast range of foods, and so can exploit our waste. The urban environments we have created are also relatively free of predators.

When conditions are ideal, black rats can reach very high numbers, giving birth to up to 12 young every five weeks or so. But the urban myths that there is one rat for every person, or that you are never less than six feet from a rat, have little support. In truth, we have no real idea of how many introduced rats there are in Australian cities.

Rats are often unwelcome housemates because of the diseases they spread in their urine and faeces, including leptospirosis (Weil’s disease), salmonella, and E. coli. They are also hosts of ticks that transmit bacterial infections and induce allergic reactions.

Black rats are important carriers of disease. Peter Banks, Author provided

Black rats are important hosts of the parasites Toxoplasmosis gondii and rat lungworm - both of which can be fatal to native wildlife and humans. Rats are also famous for carrying the plague, which arrived in Australia in the early 1900s but fortunately died out. Australia remains plague-free.

Rat damage infrastructure when building their nests. They chew electrical cables, increasing the risk of house fires, although why they do this is not clear.

Just as native rats belong in natural environments, cities are rats’ natural habitat. They may be introduced in Australia, but they have evolved in the urban habitats we have imported.

However, black rats can spill over from cities to remnant bushland, entering an environment that has not adapted to them. Here they have the potential to wreak all kinds of havoc.

Black rats are adept climbers and raid birds nests to prey on the eggs of small native birds, which may be one reason why these birds are uncommon in city parks. They also prey on other tree-dwelling wildlife such as small bats, skinks and spiders.

Black rats are aided in this conquest by humans. Almost 70% of rats living in bushland next to houses have visited those houses sometime in the previous two weeks. This undoubtedly helps to increase rat populations beyond what the natural environmental alone could support. In contrast, native rats rarely visit houses.

There are 11 things your Sprayed professional technicians look for when conducting a comprehensive rodent inspection: droppings, tracks, gnaw marks, burrowing, runways, grease/rub marks, urine stains, live or dead rodents, rodent sounds, rodent odors and nesting areas. A thorough inspection provides critical information about the size of the population and the routes taken by the rodents.

Maintenance and prevention are the keys to controlling rodents. A trained eye can help you spot problem areas and prevent an infestation before it begins. Whether you already have a problem or you’re just looking to prevent one, contact us today