Category Archives: Exterminator

Coon Con-artist

As most people know, raccoons are some the smartest, most cunning animals in the world. Well, I wouldn’t necessarily say smart I suppose, but they are extremely determined and it takes a lot to throw them off their prize. A good example of this is what happened to me in the spring of 2012, the beginning of the summer was fairly uneventful. But once the days got hotter and longer things began to take a turn for the worst. It started with just a few mishaps. In fact, I hardly would have noticed them at all if my visiting daughter hadn’t brought it up.
It all started when my daughter came down to stay with us a few days. After the first night she came downstairs in the morning complaining about the scratching and sounds she had heard in the walls all night. I was confused, I’d never heard any sounds like that. I assured her that I would spend the night in the upstairs room to make sure that there weren’t any sounds. Well needless to say, I didn’t get a wink of sleep that night! You could hear the little buggers crawling all over the place! The first thing I did the next morning was call up a professional trapper to come take care of our problem.
Well, after thoroughly checking out our house, the coon connoisseur found several entrances that the raccoons could be using. He set up cameras that would tell us which entrances the raccoons were using so that we could get them sealed. We had to endure another couple days of those dirty fur balls running around in our walls before we could check the entrances. When the day finally came for us to unveil the secret entrances those little bandits were using I could hardly contain my excitement! I was beyond ready to get rid of this problem. When the trapper got there, we crowded around his little video camera to see what the verdict was. And you’ll never believe it…
Not a single raccoon went in or out any of the entrances that we had been surveying. We were all in awe. How did the raccoons get in the house? It wasn’t like they could just walk in the front door! We sat around and talked for a while trying to brainstorm ideas of how the raccoons were getting in. We were onto the idea of them tunneling underneath the house when we heard a large crash coming from the upstairs bedroom. We rushed up the stairs to see what had caused the commotion, and there frantically running around the room was one of the raccoons!
After several minutes of frantic screaming and chasing, we finally had the raccoon subdued. The exterminator laughed when he realized that the raccoons had been getting in through the window that my daughter opened at night. Once they had entered the house, they found their way to the attic where they begun to wreak their havoc.

Hidden Figures

People say that when you see one mouse, there are many more in the shadows. Now, I don’t know if you’ve ever seen a mouse infestation. But in my 17 years of being a licensed animal control specialist, I can confirm that this saying is true. Many people don’t understand that mice breed rapidly, The average female can give birth to about 10 litters per year (each litter contains 6-8 babies) and now imagine that inside your home. Hundreds of little mice scampering under your floors, between your bedrooms, darting across your kitchen floor. It’s because of this reason that it is so vital to contact an exterminator or animal control specialist as soon as possible.
Mice can do all sorts of damage to your home, things you wouldn’t typically think of. Because mice live in nests, they will chew and rip up anything that could be used to build their home within your home. Anything from wood, installation, and even electrical wiring. Mice have no respect for your belongings, they will chew through furniture, appliances, walls and anything in between. Structural issues become a very real problem if a mouse infestation gets advanced enough. The material items are the least of your worries.
On top of being incredibly destructive, mice are known for carrying all sorts of diseases and germs. Sure, from a distance mice are super cute and fluffy. With their small plush bodies, and their small eyes and adorable ears. But if you look at them from a biological standpoint, they are the ultimate breeding ground for bacterial and viral infections. From rat-bite fever, to the plague, even Leptospirosis. These dangerous and even deadly diseases transfer even faster if the mice get into your food and you living areas. This is why it’s so important to contact a proper specialist so they can make sure to sanitize and clean properly. So please, keep yourself and your families safe from these hidden figures

Cache County Exterminator

Exterminator portrait
Portrait of an exterminator enjoying his job.
(Artwork by Sharon Davis. Contact us for her contact info.)

As a Cache County Exterminator, most people assume I hate animals.  Not true.  I probably appreciate animals more than your average Joe, because I understand them so much better.  I have to understand them to do my job right.

I’ve seen more crazy stuff in my career than most people realize.  I’ve got stories that’ll make you laugh until you cry and stories that are more gruesome than a bad horror flick.  I’ve worked with guys who scream like little girls when a little baby mouse jumps out at them from a garbage can.  I’ve pulled raccoons out of chimneys in pieces.  I’ve seen maggots and fleas raining down out of a ceiling lamp because something was rotting in the attic.  I’ve seen buildings overrun with pigeons and pigeon droppings.  I’ve seen porcupines eating the undercarriage of a car for the salt.  I’ve seen it all.  And, I still love every kind of animal I deal with.  Well, okay, I’m still not crazy about snakes, but since most are relatively harmless, I just deal with it.

One of the most common calls I get, though, as Cache County Exterminator is to remove rats out of someone’s house or business building.  And, surprisingly enough, I really love rats.  They’re pretty amazing creatures, really, built to survive.  They can jump up and run off after a 50 foot fall.  They have a great sense of taste and a fantastic memory.  They’re excellent swimmers and can live in the water for three days, which means they can survive being flushed down a toilet and return to your building by swimming upstream through the same pipes.  They climb vertical and horizontal surfaces, and can get through a hole only a half-inch wide.  They’re smart and social and pretty incredible, and I personally own two domestic rats: Shiny and Igor.

But, that doesn’t mean I’m okay with wild rats living in my home.  They transmit all kinds of nasty diseases and parasites, which infest homes and businesses.  Dead rats can build up in wall spaces or attics or basements, further contaminating the building.  They have to chew constantly to keep their teeth down, so pipes, wood, wiring, plastic are all fair game.  I know of several buildings that went up in flames because rodents chewed through electrical wires, and I’ve helped people who have water damage because rats gnawed through the pipes in the wall.  Most people who have rats in their building have to throw out a lot of food that’s been contaminated, and even couches or clothes that rats used as nesting materials and bathrooms.  One guy found out he had a rat problem when he discovered a snake eating one under his kitchen sink.

Yeah, I really do think rats and most animals I deal with are amazing creatures, even though my livelihood as Cache County exterminator is removing wild animals out of homes and businesses.  As amazing as they are, they still damage people’s property and make people sick, which is why I do what I do.

Utah County Exterminator

get rid of voles

“Hon, call the Utah County Exterminator, I think we have voles.”

“What?  We have what?”

“Voles, honey, we have voles.”

“I’ve never heard of that.  Do you mean moles?”

“No, haven’t you heard of voles?”

I felt kind of stupid, but I’d never heard of that before in my life.  Growing up, my Dad always did all the yard work.  With four girls, two of whom were fighting at any one time, he somehow always had yard work to do.  As an adult, I suspect it was an excuse to get out of the house for a little bit for some peace and quiet.  We’d never had any vole problems before, that I know of, and when I grew up and lived in apartments, I had zero yard work to do.  So, who could blame me for never hearing about voles?

My husband and I bought our first house almost three years ago, and boy was that a wake-up call.  It was a brand new home, so we put in the yard ourselves.  I’d never dug ditches, raked dirt or laid pipes for a sprinkler system before, but I sure did learn fast.  I’m not the kind of woman who makes her husband do all the outdoor chores, so I learned as I went.  I got to the point where I was proud of my calluses and got so excited when the first grass seeds sprouted.  I actually watched grass grow sometimes, and couldn’t get over how successful I felt making bare land look beautiful.  It cost more money than we really had at the time, and I lost count of the hours we worked out there, but it was worth it.  We ended up with one of the most beautiful lawns in our new subdivision.

So, now, after three years, we had to have the Utah County exterminator come over and get rid of voles, a creature I’d never heard of before.

Winter was coming to an end, and I had been looking forward to watching our lawn green up again for the spring, but I’d noticed trails of dead grass in the yard.  I thought maybe it was a result of letting the thatch build up in some places, but my husband taught me it was these little mouse-like creatures that tunnel under the lawn, chewing up grass roots and flower bulbs and sometimes even chewing the bark off of some trees.  I worried about our trees, since they were still pretty young, but fortunately the damage was mostly limited to the yard and apparently the tulip and daffodil bulbs I planted last fall.  All our work was being damaged by tiny little rodents?!  I just couldn’t bear the thought of spending my spring fighting off rodents instead of planting a garden and putting in some ornamental bushes I had my eyes on.  I agreed with my husband that we had to get the Utah County exterminator in as quickly as possible to get rid of the voles for us.

Box Elder County Exterminator

We gotta get the Box Elder County Exterminator out to our ranch here pronto, because I am sick to death of replacing fence posts.  I got enough to do around here.  Every day I work myself to exhaustion and every night I go to bed thinking of fifty more things I need to do the next day.  It’s fine, it’s the life I chose.  I’m happy that I’m working for myself and not dependant on anyone else for a paycheck.  But, when I find woodpecker holes in fence post after fence post, I have to spend my days chasing down woodpeckers and replacing those posts.  I have better things to do, and I’m no expert on which woodpeckers are protected by federal or state laws and how to get rid of woodpeckers.  The Box Elder County exterminator is, though, and I’ll let him deal with it.

I’ve been dealing with this woodpecker problem for a few years now.  I guess what finally sent me over the edge was this morning.  The ranch hasn’t been doing so well lately.  We’ve been dealing with sick cattle, a fight over mineral rights in one of our pastures, and the price of feed has skyrocketed.  High cost of feed means my prices have to go up.  High price of oil means it costs more to transport the cattle and the feed, which means I have to raise my prices again.  Now, meat prices are so high that consumers aren’t buying as much of my products as they used to, which leaves me up the proverbial creek without the proverbial paddle.  What’m I supposed to do?

So, one night I’m up late worrying over it, as usual, and I fall asleep after a rough day of work and worry.  I’d decided to let myself sleep in a bit the next morning, let myself get a little extra rest so I can tackle the problem fresh.  But, real early next morning, I hear the tap tap tap, peck peck peck of the stupid woodpeckers chipping away at the fence posts again.  I just spent last Thursday replacing some of the older posts that looked like swiss cheese, and here was this bird going at it on one of the newer stretches I finished.

I consider myself a reasonable, fair-minded person.  Live and let live.  Let nature do its thing.  But, I just lost it that day.  Got so mad I grabbed the gun.  My wife caught me before I headed out the door, though, and reasoned that the woodpecker is probably protected, and shooting at the bird on the fence post would probably just do more damage to the fence post I was trying to protect.  So, I gave in, grumbling, and tried to enjoy the huge and delicious breakfast my wife had prepared for us.  Every time that tapping started up again, my knuckles would go white and my shoulders would get all hunched.  Finally, my wife just turned on some music so I couldn’t get annoyed at the birds anymore.

Time to call the Box Elder County exterminator. I figure, even though times are tight, it would save me a lot of time and money, not to mention keeping me from getting too angry to see straight, if I just got a professional out here.

Weber County Exterminator

As a skunk, is it possible to ask the Weber County Exterminator to get rid of my embarrassing skunk problem?  I mean, it’s not for me, of course.  It’s for . . . .a friend, right.  A friend.  And, this friend of mine, also a skunk, has this thing for soda.  This is like a real addiction, you see.  She finds the cups just lying around in the parking lot, or in a park, or digs them out of people’s garbage, and then she just licks the inside of the cup until her tongue is raw and she can’t taste the sweet stuff anymore.  I just can’t get enough of the stuff.  I mean, she can’t get enough of the stuff.  And, they say the first step is to admit you have a problem and get help.

Okay, okay, I admit it, it’s not a friend, it’s me.  I’m a skunk and I have an addiction to soda.

So, the only thing I can think of to do is to ask the Weber County exterminator to help me help me get rid of the soda cups.  Is that possible?  I mean, I’m not hurting anyone . . . but it’s time to ask for help, you know.  Can we get rid of the soda cups just lying around or sitting in the garbage for me to bust into?  Because the only thing I can think of to do is to get rid of the temptation.  I’m just not strong enough to kick the habit myself.

The day I knew I needed real help was the real low point of my life.  I was just minding my own business, looking for grubs, and I walked by a house with the most wonderful smell emanating from the garbage can out front.  This was a family that drank a lot of soda, and ooooh, I could NOT resist.  I got up in the can, rooted around for a while, throwing garbage out across the lawn left and right.  A dog startled me at some point, so I had to spray it.  I couldn’t help it, I wasn’t going to run away and leave the sweet stuff behind!

At long last, I finally found it and thrust my head all the way inside, tasting those wonderful last few drops.  Oooh, pure heaven.  And when I drank every drop and even licked the wax coating off of the inside, it suddenly occurred to me that I could not get my head back out.  There I was, in someone’s driveway, wandering around in circles, my head deep in the recesses of a soda cup.  And that’s when I realized I had a real addiction.

So, what do you think?  I know the Weber County exterminator is the person other people call to take care of their wild animal problems, and I’m a wild animal with a problem.  Will he help?

Summit County Exterminator

Is it possible to get the Summit County exterminator to follow me around at the park and get rid of these dang pigeons?  Every day, rain or shine, snow or sun, I take my walk, and it used to be a wonderful perk to retirement.  I get up, put on the same dark gray jacket (rain or shine), my dark gray ball cap (snow or sun) and head out the door.  My usual route takes me about a mile and a half down the street, and then I stroll down the park paths of our neighborhood park, and another couple of miles around the business district before heading home for lunch.  I’m a regular, so people know me, and I know them.  Moms have their kids wave to the “nice man” and I wave back and keep walking.  There’s a guy I usually see who’s out jogging around 10:00 every morning, and he gives me a friendly nod as he huffs on by.  A couple of businesswomen take their smoke break around 11:00 every day, and we tease each other as I make my way past their building.  I’m the guy who waves at the cars that pass me, and some of the drivers even wave back.  Walking is just my thing.  I enjoy it every morning, have lunch at home, and then head back out to go play cards with my friends.  It’s not an exciting life, but it’s my life, and I love it.

One day I got stupid.  I had some old bread leftover at home, so I grabbed it up and took it with me on my walk.  As I walked through the park, I tossed a few crumbs here and there to feed the pigeons that roost in the nearby apartments.  And now I need my own personal Summit County exterminator.

These little suckers just won’t leave me alone.  As soon as my feet turn onto the park path, they fly down from their roosts up in the buildings adjacent to the park, poop raining down on the sidewalk and anyone else who happens to be on it.  Then, they parade after me like they expect me to give them a free handout every time I step out my door.  I’ve tried shooing them away, but they just fly up around my head, then land all around me and follow like I’m some dagum pied piper.  I even stepped on one once.  I just can’t seem to get rid of the pigeons.  Now, instead of being the happy, friendly old man who waves at people as he strolls by, I’m the crazy, grumpy old man with a pigeon problem.

Not okay.  I’ve got a phone number for the Summit County exterminator and I’m taking it over to the apartment managers.  I hope they’ll get rid of the pigeons living in their building, but if not, I’ll have to find another park to walk through every day.  Either that or just accept my fate as the leader of the pigeons.

Davis County Exterminator

I so desperately want the Davis County Exterminator to get rid of my brother.  Look, we’re all baby swallows, tucked up safely in this nest under the eaves of someone’s house.  But, I swear, this nest is getting smaller and smaller by the day.  He’s just crowding me out and cramping my style.

Mom went through a lot of trouble to make this mud nest for us before we were born.  Bit by bit, she brought tiny chunks of mud from a small distance away and stuck it up on this stucco, right over someone’s front door.  She brought in some tiny twigs to help give it structure and took her time to build it just right.  Sure, some of it fell down and spattered across the doorstep, and some of it inevitably got dropped on cars or sidewalks on her way back and forth.  But, it’s wonderfully safe, making it extra hard for any predators to get to us.  And Mom says now that us baby birds are here, the Davis County exterminator has to obey really specific laws about how to remove barn swallows, so we’re pretty safe even now.  I don’t want the Davis County exterminator to get rid of all of us, just my brother.

After we hatched, Mom worked super hard to keep us fed, and let me tell you, we’re ALWAYS hungry.  All day long, the four of us crowd at the tiny nest opening, sticking our heads out, opening our beaks as wide as possible, and taking our turns getting fed.  But, not my brother.  He always pushes and shoves, and switches places with us to try to trick Mom into feeding him twice before she gets to the rest of us.  You know, he almost pushed me right out of the nest the other day, and since he gets fed more, he’s getting bigger and bigger and it’s getting harder and harder to push back.  But, the rest of us baby swallows have had it.  We’re saying enough is enough and starting to fight back.

My sister came up with a great idea the other day.  When Mom flies off for another morsel of food, she stands up, gets on the edge of the nest, and turns around to poop out of the nest.  We learned to do that early on – let the poop fall down out of the nest onto the front step of this house instead of staining our own nest.  Well, when she’s done, she spreads her wings just a little wider and pushes big brother further back into the nest.  By that time, Mom’s back and the rest of us get a fighting chance to get the food.  It was perfect until big brother caught on.  Now we’re back to getting pushed around a lot.  So, I’m wondering, what would it take to get the Davis County exterminator to get rid of one big baby swallow?

Salt Lake County Exterminator

raccoon traps too small

I was so happy we called a Salt Lake County exterminator to get the dead raccoon out of our chimney, especially after witnessing the horror show of its removal.

My wife and I saved up for years, and finally bought a beautiful vacation cabin near a beautiful, mountainous national park, and I had grandiose ideas of hiking nearly every day we spent in our cabin property.  Truthfully, we spend more time just sitting on the porch, looking out at the view, bird-watching, talking or sitting in silence together.  We enjoy living our dream.  And, I swear, my wife had more fun furnishing and decorating the cabin than our actual home!  We put a lot of effort into our vacation spot to make it a romantic getaway for us for some weekends, and a great place for the kids and their families to join us for holidays.

So you can imagine how awful it was to show up for a long weekend, walk in the door and get hit with a nasty smell.  I’ve never smelled anything like it, but it was rancid.  My wife couldn’t take it after a while and retreated to the car while I investigated.  As I searched for the source of the smell, she called a Salt Lake County Exterminator.  The cabin wasn’t really damaged, but I was certain that smell was going to be near to impossible to get out of the front room furniture, where the odor was the greatest.  Finally, it overpowered even me, so I sat in the car and waited for the Salt Lake County Exterminator to arrive, assuring her it would all be okay and we’d still be able to enjoy the weekend.

When the Salt Lake County Exterminator arrived, he walked right over to the fireplace in the front room, shined a flashlight up there, poked around a little, and said, “Yep, you’ve got a dead raccoon in the chimney.”  He explained that raccoons will often climb down the chimney from outside, most often to bear their young, but sometimes just to find a quiet place to die.

What followed soured the entire weekend for me, but made me grateful I hadn’t attempted to remove the raccoon myself.  The dead raccoon was so far into the decomposition process that he had to remove it in pieces.  Yes, pieces.  It was like a horror movie.  I was confused at the sound I kept hearing, as he worked.  It sounded like rain coming from the chimney.  When I realized what it was, I had to beat a hasty retreat out of the cabin, close on the heels of my wife.  Maggots rained down from the raccoon corpse down the Salt Lake County Exterminator’s head and arms as he removed the raccoon.

Needless to say, we did not spend the weekend there, but we were happy his services included cleaning and sanitizing our cabin.  We didn’t have to do anything other than finding a nice hotel room in the area, and planning our next weekend getaway.