Mice are destructive and troublesome pests despite their small size, and if you see signs of them in the spring, you need pest control in Toronto for rodent removal. The mice probably aren’t moving into your home in the spring. It is more likely that they already moved in during the fall and winter as the weather was turning colder. However, now that it is warming up again, they won’t just move back out.
What Do Mice Do in the Spring?
Mice do not hibernate in the winter. Rather, they look for shelter from the cold and keep foraging for food wherever they can find it. They like to stay in human homes where it is warm and food is plentiful so that they do not have to go outside to forage.
In the spring, the snow is melting, the plants are regrowing, and some of the mice’s favourite foods are once again available outside. They will venture outside to forage, usually under the cover of darkness, but they won’t abandon their cozy indoor nest.
As with many other wild animals, warm weather is a cue for mice to start breeding and raising a new generation. The mother mouse needs a place to raise her babies that is safe and warm, and the nest she made in the walls for shelter from the winter cold is perfect. Mice don’t really have a mating season per se. Instead, they mate multiple times throughout the year, and it is only a month or two before female babies are mature enough to breed, so it doesn’t take long before you have a full-blown infestation on your hands.
How Do You Get Rid of Mice in Walls?
If the mice haven’t gotten into your home yet, you should look for and seal up any openings that could give them access. As incredible as it sounds, mice need only a hole the diameter of a Number 2 pencil to get inside your home, so look for cracks and openings in window weatherstripping and around vents or pipes. Use a door sweep to keep them from getting in the crack under the door. Repair water leaks that could keep a mouse hydrated and do other damage to your home. Do a thorough cleaning to remove crumbs that could feed mice and declutter so they have fewer places to hide.
While it is a good strategy to clean up crumbs and repair water leaks under any circumstances, it may not resolve a current infestation. This is especially true in the spring when mice have access to food and water outside.
On the other hand, you may not want to seal up the holes and openings by which the mice get in and out until the infestation is resolved. Otherwise, you could trap them inside without access to food and water. Not only is this unnecessarily cruel, but dead mice in your walls produce a horrible stench.
You may think to trap the mice without killing them and then release them outside. This isn’t a very effective strategy as the mice have keen homing instincts and may just turn around and come right back inside.
How Does Truly Nolen Help With Pest Control in Toronto?
We know how to get rid of mice in the spring. Certain animals follow predictable patterns of behaviour during particular seasons, and our Four Seasons pest control system uses knowledge of those patterns to our advantage, and yours.