East Bay homes are being inundated by pests, rodents, and even wildlife, seeking shelter from the rain and extremely cold temperatures.
Mario Martinez, the owner of All N One Pest Eliminators serviced 10 East Bay homes Tuesday with infestations ranging from ants and roaches, to mice and rats.
“All day long, people calling in frantic, got rats running around inside the living area,” he said.
His pest inspector, Rodney Douglas, said rodents aren't hiding in just the usual crawl spaces and attics. This winter, he's seen a lot more uninvited guests right out in the open, in people's living spaces.
“They're going for pet food, they're going through pet doors,” said Douglas.
In Lafayette, Gilbert Jaimez, owner of Ratman Pest and Termite Control, is seeing the same problem among his customers.
Wildlife is moving in too. Racoons, opossums, and most often: skunks. Martinez recently removed a family of five baby skunks from underneath a house.
Local
“They like to burrow, they love decks and they like to burrow underneath the foundation to get underneath the homes,” said Douglas.
Inside Bill’s Ace Hardware in Martinez, owner Bill Wygal is bracing for a surge in customers over the next few days when the rain lets up and homeowners have a chance to patch up any areas of their home that rodents are entering through.
Get a weekly recap of the latest San Francisco Bay Area housing news. Sign up for NBC Bay Area’s Housing Deconstructed newsletter.
“I would like to always point out that people go the less toxic way to start with,” said Bill Wygal, owner of Bill’s Ace Hardware in Martinez and Concord.
He recommends using steel wool, and if you're using old fashioned traps, “peanut butter works usually, and we found recently that plain walnuts for baking. Get them at the grocery stores and put a few chunks on there and the mice will usually go for that,” he said.
People want to avoid using toxic chemicals outdoors against pests and rodents when it rains or is about to rain, because those chemicals get into our storm drains, and then into our rivers and creeks.
“The number one thing is use your products in a safe manner,” said Wygal.
