Only some people are cut out to be professional pest exterminators or are interested in dealing with the pesky critters that get into our homes when we least expect it. That’s one reason why Precise Termite & Pest Control has emerged as northern New Jersey’s preferred choice for ridding local households of everything from mice to ants, bees, birds, mosquitoes, cockroaches, bats, and more.

Over the past 30+ years, we’ve learned a lot about being in this industry, including the many misconceptions people have about the extermination business. Here are some rodent control myths we’d like to debunk and set the record straight on!

1. MYTH: Not Seeing Rodents Means No Problem

Just because you don’t see them doesn’t mean they’re not there. Rodents do everything they can to avoid contact with humans, typically coming out only at night when you are sleeping. If you see one rodent, chances are there are more, especially during the daytime.

2. MYTH: Clean Homes Are Rodent-Free Homes

Rodents are not picky about the houses they infest and take up residence in clean homes as well as dirtier ones. Your location and surroundings affect the level of rodent activity. However, rodents like clutter, so keep the outside of your home and yard free from attractive hiding spots, and clean up spills and crumbs immediately.

3. MYTH: Poison Is the Best Solution

Some DIY enthusiasts take a ruthless approach to rodent control and fill their homes with rat poison to tackle infestation issues. However, rodent poison can take up to 10 weeks to work, which means that they can continue to destroy your property and breed before they die. The stench of dead rodents in your home isn’t just sickening; it can contaminate the air you breathe and make you actually sick. Rodent poison left out can also put children and pets at risk of being poisoned as well.

4. MYTH: Cheese is a Rodent’s Favorite Food

In cartoons, rats and mice gravitate toward cheese more than anything else. But in real life, there are better baits to use than cheese. Sneaky and agile rodents can remove cheese from traps without setting them off. Sticky substances like peanut butter and high-aroma foods like meat are often more enticing to rodents than cheese.

5. MYTH: Rodents Only Inhabit Homes in the Winter

Another rodent control myth is that these pests are only seasonal concerns. However, rodents are four-season pests that affect homeowners all throughout the year. Mouse and rat activity typically picks up in the fall when rodents sense a drop in temperature and start preparing for winter survival. In the spring and summer, rodents seek shelter indoors to breed and give birth.

6. MYTH: Pets Will Take Care of Rodents

Cats make wonderful additions to households as pets but aren’t always the most effective exterminators. Cats, dogs, and other household pets may deter some rodent activity, but they cannot address rodent issues inside walls, up in the attic, or in other hard-to-reach places. Rodents may also access food and water from your pets’ bowls, contaminating them and potentially making them sick.

We Can Help with Your Rodent Problem

With these rodent control myths busted, we hope you better understand how rodents affect a home and why professional help is needed for mice and rats. Precise Termite & Pest Control specializes in rodent control and offers free inspections to help you get a handle on your rodent problem.

Please contact us today at 866-971-2847 to learn more about our approach to rodent extermination and prevention or to schedule your initial visit.

Scratching, scurrying, and squeaking from behind your walls are telltale signs that you have a mouse problem. Mice often seek shelter in walls because they offer warmth from our harsh weather conditions in New Jersey. Cracks in your home’s foundation, holes in the siding, and gaps around doors and windows can be potential entry points for mice to enter your walls. Once inside, mice are excellent climbers and can scale walls and access other parts of your house as well. Mice can squeeze through spaces as small as a dime, and getting them out can be very difficult without professional help.

In this article, we discuss the issue of mice in walls and how to get rid of mice in walls quickly and effectively.

The Problem with Mice in Walls

Mice entering your walls can cause structural damage and chew through electrical wiring. Mice breed quickly, meaning that just a few mice can become a full-blown infestation before you know it. There is a risk of mice contaminating your food supply and bringing fleas, lice, or other troublesome pests into your home.

Mice often hide during the daytime and come out at night to look for food. When the sun goes down and you go to bed, they become more active and can leave greasy tracks behind as they move. You may also find nests made of soft materials in your walls and fecal droppings around your walls if you have a mouse problem.

Preventing Mice in Walls

Fortunately, there are ways to prevent mice from getting into your walls in the first place with a few easy steps. Keep food sources away from the walls of your home, especially pet food bowls. Ensure food is stored in airtight containers, and avoid leaving fruit and snacks lying on countertops. Sealing any cracks, gaps, or holes in your walls is also helpful to prevent mice from entering them. You can purchase mice deterrent products from a hardware store or use peppermint essential oil combined with water in a spray bottle to spread around a scent that mice hate.

 How to Get Rid of Mice in Walls

An initial DIY approach to having mice in walls is to set traps to kill the mice upon contact. Many people choose lethal traps rather than poison baits so that mice do not die inside the walls and begin to decay, causing noxious odors and increasing your disease risk. Rodenticides can be dangerous to use in a home with children and pets, and some mice are actually resistant to these types of poisons, making them mildly effective at best. Drilling a hole in the drywall near the floor may be necessary to lure mice outside with traps.

Get Professional Extermination Help

However, the best way to get rid of mice in walls is to call the extermination professionals at Precise Termite & Pest Control because of how tricky they are to remove from these areas. Mice infestations in walls are incredibly challenging because DIY attempts often result in creating multiple holes in your walls to get them out. To minimize damage to your home and ease your stress, we offer expert mice control and prompt mice removal services with a 100% satisfaction guarantee.

For your free mice in walls inspection, please contact us online or call us at 866-971-2847.

Certain scents attract mice to indoor spaces, such as sweet fruits, pet food, meat, and greasy food. The reason why people put peanut butter and cheese in mouse baits is because mice love these scents.

But on the other hand, what scents do mice hate, and what smells will keep mice away? Here are some items you can place around your house to deter mice based on their sense of smell.

Vinegar

Many people already have a bottle of vinegar in the house, so this is an easy DIY remedy for mice. Vinegar has a powerful smell, and you can use either white vinegar or apple cider vinegar for this purpose. One idea is to soak cotton balls in vinegar and place them in areas where you think rodents are getting inside. Vinegar can also be used to clean areas that have been affected by rodents.

Citronella

Most people think of mosquitoes with citronella, but some also use it to eliminate mice. The strong smell can be too much for mice to handle, keeping both pests away from your home and property. You can find citronella in the form of sprays, candles, pouches, essential oils, and live plants.

Mothballs

Mothballs prevent moths from eating clothing but may also help keep mice away. The balls contain naphthalene, a substance that mice despise. However, this idea comes with some warnings because studies suggest that naphthalene can also be toxic to humans with excessive or prolonged exposure, causing issues with your lungs and the tissues in your nasal canal.

Cinnamon

Even though you may love the smell of cinnamon in holiday drinks and baked goods, mice don’t feel the same way. The spicy aroma of cinnamon can deter mice while being a pleasant scent for you to have around the house. To use cinnamon as a mouse-deterrent, hide cinnamon sticks under furniture and inside cabinets and drawers.

Mint

Mice are not fans of mint, which is why some people use peppermint oil to keep mice away. Peppermint oil is a heavily concentrated form of the scent, so it may be more effective than just having a live mint plant growing in your home. However, the oil can irritate your skin, so be careful while handling it. Alternatively, you can rub some mint toothpaste along baseboards and around cracks in your home to discourage them from entering.

Chili Powder and Oil

Anyone who has tried spicy food can attest to the fact that chili powder is a lot to handle. For a more concentrated version of this spice, you can also try chili oil around your home to deter mice.

What to Do When Scent-Deterrents Don’t Work

If you have tried a few scent-deterrents to address your mice problem and it’s not working, it’s time to call Precise Termite & Pest Control. We have been keeping Northern New Jersey mice-free for over 30 years and understand the different kinds of mice, the diseases they carry, and the damage they can cause.

Our professional extermination methods go far beyond just adding scents around your home, and we can use a combination of techniques depending on your situation, such as trapping and exclusion. Please get in touch with us at 866-971-2847 for your free mice inspection today!

Mice are resilient little rodents who seem to be able to live just about anywhere, such as attics, basements, walls, and kitchen pantries. But one place that many people don’t think about mice taking up residence is the couch. There’s something very unsettling about the thought of mice hanging out where you sit to relax and cuddle up with a book or watch TV. But mice in couch problems definitely exist, and we’re here to help when they happen to you.

Can Mice Live in Couches?

The short answer to this question is yes, mice can live in couches and make their homes among the soft cushions here. Some homeowners have taken DIY approaches to rodent control and thought they had a mice issue handled when they stopped seeing them in familiar areas. However, little did they know that the mice had migrated to the couch and started to destroy a valuable piece of furniture that they previously believed to be safe, clean, and comfortable.

Why Mice Like Couches

Couches are attractive places for mice, just like they are among our favorite places to spend time as humans. Couches are filled with soft materials that are cozy and make excellent nesting materials. The inside of couches are hidden away from the outside world and the humans and pets that may disturb them. It’s also a great place for pregnant female mice to have their babies and keep them safe and warm. If you have a habit of snacking on your couch, mice will find those tiny crumbs between the cushions and have their own little feast from your leftovers!

How to Identify a Mice Nest in Couch

One of the most common signs of a mice nest in a couch is mice droppings, which are fecal pellets left behind from these unwanted couch residents. A single mouse can create dozens of droppings per day, which will be noticeable when you rotate your couch cushions or remove them to vacuum your couch.

Other signs of mouse activity in your couch are gnawed portions of fabric, the smell of urine, and bits of stuffing on the floor. If you are quiet, you may even hear squeaking or scratching noises coming from your couch when you are not sitting on it.

We Can Get Rid of Mice in Your Couch

If you have noticed signs of mice in the couch or have any sneaking suspicions that they are living here, don’t live another day in these troublesome conditions. Precise Pest Control is the go-to source for mouse control in Northern New Jersey, and we are in the business of helping people get mice out of their couches for good.

Our professionally trained exterminators know the best ways to remove mice from couches so that you can assess the damage and make the best decision about your furniture. The longer you wait to take action, the more damage mice can cause in a couch. If you catch the problem early, you may be able to have the couch cleaned and repaired so that you don’t have to buy a brand-new couch and put a strain on your budget.

Then, going forward, we can provide you with helpful tips about how to keep mice from getting into your couch in the future, such as promptly cleaning up crumbs, strategically placing mice deterrents, and sealing up gaps and holes in your home.

Contact us today for a free mice inspection and protect the home furniture you love.

Mice are resilient little rodents who to take up residence nearly anywhere in a home or yard. However, one of the most common places for mice to live in a home is the basement. There are a few different ways that mice get into basements, and this can cause a variety of problems for homeowners.

Fortunately, Precise Termite & Pest Control is here to help get rid of mice in your basement and keep them out of this area of your home.

Why Mice Live in Basements

There are various things that attract mice to basement areas, such as storage boxes and piles of clutter. These are prime places for mice to build nests, so it is best to use plastic storage containers instead of cardboard boxes and to place them away from walls to eliminate hiding spaces. There are lots of excellent hiding places in basements, so keep the area free of clutter to deter mice.

Mice may choose to live in a basement if there is food stored there or exposed insulation lying around to provide an attractive nesting spot. Basements are also preferred by mice because they tend to be dark, cool, and have less human activity than other parts of a home.

How Mice Get Into Basements

Mice often get into basements through holes and cracks that aren’t properly sealed up. Mice only need a tiny amount of space to squeeze through, so you might not even notice miniature gaps around plumbing, wiring, floors, and where the foundation meets the ground.

One of the first steps in mouse control is finding the entry point that mice use to get inside and sealing any openings that exist. Signs that you have mice in the basement are tracks on the floor, gnaw marks, a musky smell, and fecal droppings. Even a single mouse in a basement can be an issue because of the risk of spreading diseases, such as salmonellosis and leptospirosis, through their excrement. Another with mice risk is the spread of parasites, including mites, fleas, and ticks. Mice can also cause a lot of damage in a basement if they chew through electrical wiring and create dangerous fire hazards.

We Can Help Get Rid of Mice in Basements

At Precise Termite & Pest Control, we regularly help New Jersey residents get rid of mice in their basements by determining how they are accessing the space and by deploying various rodent control tactics based on the situation. Our extermination professionals know the safest and most effective ways to deal with basement mice.

To prevent mice from coming back into your basement, we will develop a strategy with you that may include removing food sources in the basement, sealing up trash, fixing water leaks, and sealing the home’s foundation. It may also help to put weather stripping around the basement door to prevent mice in the basement from traveling to other parts of the house as well.

We offer same-day service for customers in Bergen, Passaic, Morris, Essex, and Sussex counties to get your mice problem resolved right away. Contact us at 866-971-2847 for more information about how we get rid of mice in basements and for a free inspection of your basement and other areas of your home.