Mouse Removal in Colorado Springs

Mice are the call we hear about most, and fall is when it starts. Colorado Springs usually gets its first freeze around the start of October, per KOAA's weather team, and the mice that spent the summer in yards and open space start looking for somewhere warmer. A basement furnace room, a garage full of boxes or the space behind the kitchen drawers will do.

There are two kinds of mice in these calls. House mice live with people wherever people are. Deer mice are the field mice of the foothills and the plains, and they're the ones the health department talks about because they can carry hantavirus. If you think you have deer mice, read deer mouse control before you start cleaning anything.

What people notice first

Usually it's a sound. A quick, light scratching in a wall or above the ceiling after the house goes quiet. Then droppings: small, dark, about the size of a grain of rice, along baseboards, in drawers, under the sink. A few other clues:

• Holes chewed in the corners of cereal, flour or dog food bags
• Shredded paper or insulation tucked into a box or a drawer
• A stale, musty smell in a cabinet or closet
• Droppings on garage shelves or around the water heater

Where mice get into Springs homes

Per the CDC, a dime-sized hole is enough for some rodents. On a Colorado Springs house, those gaps tend to be low and on the outside: the garage door corners and bottom seal, where the gas line or AC line enters, dryer vents with a flap that sticks open, weep holes and cracks along the foundation. Older houses on the West Side have settled for a century. Newer houses out east in Powers and Stetson Hills mostly lose the battle at the garage.

Garages matter a lot here. Plenty of people store bird seed, grass seed, dog food and camping gear in the garage, and mice set up in all of it before they ever reach the kitchen. Mice in garages and cars covers that side.

What the provider does

The tech walks the outside first, low and slow, looking at the foundation line, the garage door, utility entries and vents. Inside, they check the furnace room, under sinks, behind appliances, storage areas and the attic hatch. Snap traps go along the walls where droppings are. If bait is used, it should be in locked, tamper-resistant stations, never loose pellets.

Then they close the openings with metal mesh, sealant, door sweeps and a new garage door seal if yours is worn out. Entry sealing explains that part. Trapping without sealing just makes room for the next batch.

Related rodent jobs: Deer Mouse Control, Entry Sealing and Exclusion, Attic and Nest Cleanup

Available in Briargate, Rockrimmon, Black Forest, Monument and Tri-Lakes, Falcon and Peyton, Broadmoor and Cheyenne Cañon, Manitou Springs, Old Colorado City and the West Side, Fountain, Security-Widefield, Powers and Stetson Hills.