Pest Invasions Seem Earlier This Year
FRIDLEY (WCCO) -- Whether homeowners have ants, earwigs, bees or mice in invading their house, they just want the little invaders gone.
"I mean, all the calls we get, people are pretty desperate by the time they call us," said an operator at Plunkett's Pest Control in Fridley.
For desperate folks, like Anitra Payne, the mice are moving in. After finding their telltale droppings under her kitchen sink, she's had enough.
"In the kitchen, it's not very sanitary," said Payne. "I can only imagine them walking across the dishes and the silverware."
While there's no evidence of that, she's still taking action to rid the little rodents. That's where Plunkett's Nick Puchtel takes over. With flashlight and tools, he scoured her house to find their hiding spots.
"What we do is take a look around the outside of the house and fill the holes we find," said Puchtel. "From there, we set up traps to get rid of the mice."
Holes around the home's foundation, where siding meets the block wall and where utilities enter the home, are all likely entrance points. Puchtel will carefully plug the entrance points with a stiff metal mesh.
Then it's time to trap.
"It's just a tube with two snap traps inside of it. The mice run through the conduit so it creates a natural run for them," Puchtel explains.
For Payne, it's all a bit alarming, especially when she finds what they're looking for.
"It's startling to check the traps sometimes when you're not expecting to find anything and then you do," said Puchtel.
Finally, a word to the wise: If your home has mice, take care of it today, or their will be many more tomorrow. Two mice can have 48 babies a year, according to Puchtel.
