I received a call from a potential commercial client regarding a potential rodent infestation in August of 2024. When I arrived onsite, I noted that we were dealing with a large, older built facility that had a shared space with another business. The buildings shared exterior walls, however, were separate businesses with separate entrances. Only one of the businesses seemed to have spoken to the landlord about having any concerns with rodents.
Curtis was waiting outside for me when I parked. He explained that this was a newer location for their company and had been having issues even getting an inspector from other pest control companies to come out to the site to get an evaluation. I asked him what issues they had been seeing in the facility. “One of our guys thinks we have rats” he said. “Rats…?” I ask?
I asked Curtis if he has a bit of time to walk around and give me a rundown on the history of their pest issues in the facility. As we began to walk around, I noticed that this facility does not have any food storage or much draw for rats. Curtis tells me that they distribute promotional materials for beverage companies. I ask if they distribute liquor or bar snacks or other items that would be considered a food source for rats. Only promotional items. Shirts, posters, display cases, wall art and items that one would see in any liquor store or local watering hole.
As we continued to the area where the “rats” were seen, I only picked up on some light mouse activity. He tells me that he had personally never seen anything when on shift. I scoured the building on the interior looking for droppings, footprints in the dust, anything that would indicate rat sign in the building. Nothing.
From there I perform an ocular pat down around the exterior of the building. As I walk around, we find a huge overgrown area on the northeast side of the building which lines up with the mouse activity on the interior of the building. We found a few small gaps that would allow mouse entry into the facility, but nothing big enough for rats to enter. As we continued the inspection, I found a wall void nest of yellow jackets that the client was unaware of. No signs of rats. We agree that we are dealing with a small mouse population, some yellowjackets as well as general insect issues such as spiders, boxelder bugs and ants.
A facility that is not owned by the renters, that also shares space with another business can be difficult to perform sealing work on. Renters are not responsible for fixing deficiencies in the building and seldom want to pay out of pocket to repair what they do not own. Understandably so.
I write them a proposal to start with an exterior baiting campaign, as well as general insect control on their portion of the building, with expectations that the baiting campaign and insect control will only target their section of the facility, and therefore, only reduce the pressure on the facility from the pests in the areas we have control over. I recommend having the overgrown area removed to put less harborage and pressure from the rodents on the building.
Curtis explains to me that this may take some time as the parent company is based out of Florida, and they typically are not in a big hurry to green light any projects. I sent him the proposal and extended my contact information to keep me posted on the status of the project.
3 months later, I get a text message from Curtis stating that he got the corporate office to move forward with the proposal which included monthly baiting and insect control. We set up our exterior baiting campaign, eliminated the yellowjacket wall void nest the next week. We have had the account now for 4 months. No rat sightings or major insect issues have been reported since our initial treatments and rodenticide bait station installations.
