Mouse Control in North Georgia

It's been said that if you build a better mousetrap, the world will beat a path to your door, and there's a lot of history to back up that saying. Mice have been pests of humankind for all of recorded history, and mouse control is one of the most in-demand services provided by exterminators throughout the world. People have been trying to keep mice out of their homes and businesses pretty much forever.

In urban parts of Georgia, mouse control is most in demand in the fall and early winter. That's when mice and rats start looking for warm, cozy places to spend the cooler months. In more rural areas of Georgia, on the other hand, mouse control is more of a year-round problem. Keeping mice out of stables, barns, silos, and other agricultural buildings can be a real challenge.

The Common House Mouse

The adult house mouse, Mus musculus, averages about three inches in length (not including the tail) and is usually gray or brown in color, with white or light-colored bellies. They have relatively large and prominent ears, and their tails are roughly the same length as their bodies. Their ears and tails have very little hair.

Mice can squeeze through very small gaps: a hole the size of a dime, or a crack the thickness of a pencil.

The house mouse's skeletal system allows mice to squeeze through very narrow openings. An adult house mouse can squeeze through a crack about the width of the thickness of a pencil, or through a hole about the size of a dime. This not only allows mice to get into homes and other buildings through tiny openings, but also enables them to travel throughout a home inside its structural voids. Mice can be found anywhere in a house from the attic down to the basement or crawl space. But given a choice, they usually settle down very near to their food sources.

Part of the reason mice like to stay close to home is that they have relatively poor vision and navigate mainly by smell and touch. They feel their way along walls and other vertical surfaces and are uncomfortable in open spaces where they are more vulnerable to predators.

Paradoxically, however, mice are also very curious creatures who readily explore new objects in their environments, including mousetraps. In fact, professional mouse exterminators often use no bait at all on certain types of mouse traps, relying on the mouse's natural curiosity instead.

Mice and Public Health

Mice can spread serious diseases when they get into stored foods.

A lot of people don't realize this, but mice pose a very serious risk to public health.

Mice are directly involved in the transmission of several serious diseases including Lymphocytic Choriomeningitis Virus, leptospirosis, salmonellosis, and dysentery. They're also hosts to parasites such as ticks and fleas, which in turn are involved in the transmission of serious diseases including Lyme disease, murine typhus, and plague.

In addition, because of their small size and inquisitive nature, mice come into closer contact with humans than do their larger cousins, the rats. Mice often get into kitchen cupboards, for example, where they gnaw through food packages to get at the goodies inside, contaminating the food with their saliva, hair, and bodily wastes in the process, and spreading germs everywhere they go.

Mice also get into drawers, closets, and other storage spaces more easily, where they damage and contaminate clothing, utensils, and other stored items. Mice are gnawers and nibblers, and it's common for them to gnaw little pieces out of every garment in a drawer, while also contaminating and staining the clothing with their droppings and urine.

Rid-A-Critter's IPM Approach to Mouse Control

Mice chewed through insulation at this Monroe, Georgia mouse control job.

Most mouse exterminators rely primarily on poisons to control mice. They place bait trays or boxes in strategic areas throughout your home, and then comes back on a regular basis (usually monthly) to refill them. They do this pretty much forever in most cases. That's because although the mice die after they eat the rodenticide, new mice quickly move in to replace the old mice. So the mouse problem is never really solved. Mouse control done without mouse exclusion is basically an endless cycle of swapping old mice for new mice.

That's not how we do things. Consistent with our emphasis on Integrated Pest Management (IPM), Rid-A-Critter emphasizes non-chemical mouse control over the use of rodenticides. We trap the mice, remove them from your home, and use exclusion techniques to keep the mice out.

In almost all cases, in fact, We can eradicate a mouse problem and keep them out of your home without using any chemicals at all. Our non-chemical mouse control program emphasizes habitat modification, trapping, and exclusion as the primary mouse control tools.

Our non-chemical, "green" approach to mouse control is also more environmentally responsible than using poisons because eliminating the need for pesticides also eliminates the risk of accidental poisoning of pets or non-target animals. It also results in a more permanent mouse control solution because it helps prevent "new" mice from getting into the building after the "old" mice are removed. Finally, it virtually eliminates the chances of mice dying in your home and causing odor and insect problems.

In the long run, our IPM approach to mouse control is also more economical because it's a more permanent mouse control solution. With good mouse-proofing, there's no need for a technician to return every month to fill bait stations. The mice are sealed out of your house.

North Georgia Mouse Control Gallery

Here are a few pictures of mouse extermination jobs we've done. (Stay tuned -- more on the way!)

Rid-A-Critter is Georgia's largest and most well-established non-chemical mouse control company. We have technicians living and working throughout our North Georgia service area. So if you're ready to try a new, more environmentally responsible, and more permanent solution to get rid of mice from your home or business, please contact us for a prompt inspection by one of our local experts.

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Rid-A-Critter provides mouse control and mouse proofing in all of North Georgia, including Athens, Atlanta, Alpharetta, Canton, Carrollton, Cartersville, Cumming, Dacula, Doraville, Dunwoody, Ellijay, Flowery Branch, Gainesville, Kennesaw, Jasper, Lawrenceville, Loganville, Macon, Milton, Norcross, Rome, Roswell, Suwanee, Villa Rica, Winston, Woodstock, and everywhere in between.