Rat Control in Georgia

How to Get Rid of Rats -- Permanently

Most pest control operators look at rat control as primarily a chemical job. They set out rat poison, but do little in the way of non-chemical rat control, such as sealing rat holes. The result: a lifetime relationship between you and your exterminator. He shows up every month to set out more poison, and you pay him every month to do it.

That's not how we work.

Unlike most Georgia rat exterminators, we emphasize non-chemical rat control. Consistent with our Integrated Pest Management philosophy, we emphasize rat trapping, habitat modification, and rodent exclusion ("rat-proofing") to keep rodents out of your home or business, so "new" rats don't move in to replace the rats we catch and remove.

In fact, we complete most rat control jobs using no poisons at all. Non-chemical rat control means reduced risk to humans, livestock, and pets, as well as less risk of rats dying inside your house and stinking it up.

We also utilize high-tech methods, such as a motion-activated, infrafed camera, to determine how many rats there are and how they're getting into your home, as shown in the video on the right. Using the "Rat Cam" allows us to be absolutely certain that we've found and repaired every hole, just to be sure that we've sealed the rats out of your house. (Click here and here for more Rat Cam videos.)

In addition to being "green" and environmentally-friendly, non-chemical rat control has many practical benefits:

• Non-chemical rat control is safer for pets, livestock, non-target animals, and children.
• Rats killed by pesticides often die in inaccessible areas like walls, ceilings, attics, and crawl spaces -- and stick up your house for months. In fact, we do a lot of dead rat removal jobs, picking up carcasses that other rat exterminators left behind.
• Dead rodents create a health hazard. Flies breed in their rotting carcasses and carry germs to areas occupied by humans, domestic animals, or livestock.
• Rat parasites such as ticks, fleas, and mites seek new hosts when the rats they were living on die. These parasites spread a wide variety of arboviral diseases.
• Rat exterminators who don't rat-proof buildings aren't eliminating the problem. There's no sense in killings rats inside a house unless you also prevent new rats from getting in.

Rat exclusion and trapping avoid all of these problems and provide the most effective, long-term rat control. Trapped rats don't wander off to die inside walls and structural voids and stink up your house. Instead, they are promptly removed from your home before they start to decompose and stink.

Integrated Pest Management and Rat Control

There are some rat control situations in which the selective and judicious use of rodenticides (rat poisons) makes sense. But even in these situations, non-chemical control should be the primary rat control method, and rodenticides used only as needed. Some situations in which rodenticide use is justified include:

• Some commercial food-processing plants are required by law or industry standards to have exterior bait stations around the building's perimeter.
• Warehouses and other buildings with loading docks often need bait stations because they have to leave the loading doors open for extended periods of time, making rat exclusion impractical as a complete solution.
• There are many situations in which rats outside a building are a problem, even though the rats are not getting into the building.
• Baiting for rats is sometimes required by government agencies to get a demolition or building permit.
• Wide-area public health rat control programs often require the use of rat baits in sewers, storm drains, and other rat-prone areas.

Rat Control Gallery

Here are some pictures of rat control jobs we've done over the years.

With offices throughout North-Central Georgia, Rid-A-Critter has the tools and personnel to handle any rat control or mouse control job, so please call us today.