Tag Archives: rat exterminator

How long does dead rat smell?

rat removal

“How long does a dead rat smell for?”  I blinked when I read my brother’s Facebook status update.  Who says that?  He usually likes to have political discussions with his Facebook friends or put up pictures of his kids.  But, this was random.  I had to know what was going on, so I sent him a message.

“Is this a real rat or a political rat?  LOL”

“Very funny,” came back his reply.

Now, my curiosity was piqued.  What on earth was he talking about?  I decided to email him instead.  “Who asks that kind of question?  How long does a dead rat smell?”

He replied pretty quickly.  “I’m serious.  I need to know how long a dead rat smells.  We had some rats in the garage and I set out some poison, and now I’m stuck with this nasty smell, and I want to know how long I’m going to have to deal with it.  Any ideas?”

Unfortunately, I did have a good idea, since I’d dealt with that same thing a few years ago.  My son was poking around the attic one day and apparently found a dead rat.  From what I understand, he’d gotten my work gloves out, put the dead rat in a box, and carried it down to his room with thoughts of using it for a science project.  He got distracted with something else, the dead rat box got shoved under his bed, and two days later the entire family had to search the entire house in an attempt to discover the source of an awful stench.  Eventually, my son remembered the dead rat from the attic.  The box was retrieved and his room was cleaned and sanitized.  So, how long does a dead rat smell?  At least two days, and probably a lot longer than that!

This wasn’t the answer my brother needed, though.  It was summer, and if the dead rat was in the garage, it would probably decompose fairly quickly, with a lot of flies and stench involved.  My brother and his wife had taken to parking their cars outside instead of using their nice, big garage for its intended purpose, just to avoid having to smell the dead rat.  Letting it decompose on its own, then, was really not a good solution.  They had to get rid of the dead rat.  His Facebook friends all agreed.

I suggested a good rodent removal company, and he got them out there pretty quickly.  Good thing he did, too, because it turned out he had more than one dead rat rotting in his garage.  There had been an entire rat nest.  They found it in one of the boxes containing Halloween decorations.  Appropriate, don’t you think?  The whole box got tossed and rat traps were set.  My brother’s family could go back to actually using their garage and my brother went back to his Facebook political discussions.  We never did find out the answer to that question, though.  How long does a dead rat smell?  The answer is, no one wants to deal with the dead rat long enough to find out.

Smell Dead Rat In Wall

get rid of rats

“I smell a dead rat in the wall, help!!”  I sent my text to my husband at work, desperate.  It took a little longer than usual for him to respond to me, but soon his text came back.

“Be home at 6.”

I wasn’t sure I could wait all day long for him to come home at the normal time.  My son’s Boy Scout troop was scheduled to come over to our house that night at 6:30 for their troop meeting, and there was a horrible stench in the front room.

“How do you know it’s a dead rat?”  My husband texted.

My fingers flew over the tiny keyboard.  “Saw rat poop by baseboard on Monday.  Set out poison.  Pretty sure it’s a dead rat.”

“Why didn’t you tell me?” he questioned.

“Didn’t want to bother you.”  I responded, cringing.  This whole week was a busy week for him at work, and I’d wanted to take care of the rat problem myself without imposing any extra worry or work on him.  He’d do the same for me any day, so I thought I’d return the favor.  I knew the irony was that I was imposing on him on the busiest day of the week, but a dead rat smell was horrific, and I didn’t want to cancel on my son’s Scout troop.

“Smell of dead rat in wall is awful!” I sent, hoping he’d hear the desperation in my text.  It really was awful.  I had thought laying out rat poison at night, after the kids went to bed, would be safest.  I figured the rat would come out as usual, eat the poison, and disappear somewhere to die quietly.  I woke up before anyone else the next morning and had it all cleaned up before the kids got up.  I had thought it was the perfect solution.  Apparently, I had been wrong.

My cell rang.  It was my husband.  Texting wasn’t enough, apparently.

“Hon, even if I came home right now, I probably wouldn’t be able to get the dead rat out of the wall in time.  Can you tell by the smell where the dead rat is?”

“It’s in the front room somewhere, probably by the front wall, because that’s where I saw the rat droppings before.”

“So, I’d have to come home, smell where the dead rat is in the wall, cut out the dry wall and hope that I cut a hole in the right place.  Getting rid of a dead rat is pretty involved.”

“I figured it would be.  Is there any chance at all we can get rid of the dead rat in the wall before the kids come over tonight?”

“I really don’t think so.  Why don’t you call a service to remove the dead rat out of the wall?  They’ll give you an estimate on how long it would take and whether you can still have the meeting tonight or not.”

“Good idea.  Sorry to have bothered you, but this dead rat smell is just awful.”

“I bet.  Good luck, hon.  Love you.”

“Love you, too.”

I followed his advice and gave them a call.  “I smell a dead rat in the wall, help!” I told them.  They came out that afternoon, but I still had to postpone the meeting for another day.  No reason to subject poor, innocent Boy Scouts to that stench.

I sent a last text to my husband later.  “I was right, it was a dead rat.  What do you want for dinner?”

He responded, “Let’s go out.  Maybe do vegetarian tonight?”

“Good idea!”

Rodent Removal Service

Working for a rodent removal service, I’ve heard it all.  I say I’ve heard it all, because my job is not removing rodents.  I work in the office as support staff.  I handle the incoming calls from people desperate for rodent removal service, I make appointments, I cut paychecks.  I’m essentially a one-woman show keeping the operation running smoothly so my guys can focus on their jobs, getting rid of rats, trapping mice, and removing all kinds of other rodents from people’s properties.

I get all the great and awful stories, though.  People who need rodent removal service tell me what’s been going on at their home, office or property.  The technicians tell me horror stories of rat swarms, mice nests, and all kinds of other critters.

One day, though, I got to see it all for myself, and really learned just how valuable rodent removal service is to our community.

A call came in from a woman who runs a small farm with her husband.  She told me, like most farmers in the area, rat problems come with the territory.  They’ve trapped rats, killed rats, poisoned rats and gotten rid of rats for as long as they’ve operated the farm.  But, this year the rat population just seemed to be exploding and they were overrun with rats.  They were desperate for our rodent removal services so they could spend more time on farm production and less on rodent removal.

The only technician we had available at the time couldn’t drive.  It was silly, really, because he’d forgotten to renew his license and let it expire, but until he got it renewed, he couldn’t drive out to the property.  It was at the end of the day, and I volunteered to drive him out there.

We pulled up, and the woman came out to show us where the biggest rat infestation was.  I was curious, because I’d never actually seen our technicians at work, so I hopped out of the truck and joined the two of them as they approached the large barn.  She led us to a back door, where they usually stored extra bags of feed and some tools.  She told us that’s where they needed rodent removal service the most, and then she high-tailed it back to the house, leaving us to open the door ourselves.  I was starting to get a little nervous, and my friend instructed me to stand off to the side of the door as he opened it.

When that door opened, it was like a scene from a nightmare.  Have you ever seen a cloud of gnats or an anthill that’s been disturbed?  Try multiplying that a hundred times and making it rats, and then you’ll have an idea of what I saw.  They literally poured out of the barn, running over each other, leaping, biting, scattering like roaches.  I couldn’t breathe as they swarmed over my boots before they ran off into the farmyard, seeking out any hole, door or ditch they could find.  No sound came out of my mouth, but inside I was screaming.  Eventually the rat flow slowed and I looked up at my friend, wondering how on earth he was going to get rid of these rats.  Even he looked shocked, and he admitted he’d never seen anything like this before.

I retreated to the truck and called some of our other technicians, making them promise to come out to the farm to help out just as soon as they were finished with their current appointments.  More than ever, I was proud I worked for a rodent removal service, proud of what we did for our community, proud that we were the ones people could call for help.

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.