What Smell Do Rats Hate?

Rats are said to be quite emphatic and smart creatures, but unwelcome visitors in the house, because of their destructive nature. They have several abilities that make them thrive well wherever they find themselves such as being skilled in swimming, hiking, and jumping.

Perhaps the most important ability they possess is their sense of smell with which they can find their way to food. Smart as these pests are, there are some methods you can easily apply to get rid of them based on the smells they like or detest. Here are a few simple tactics you can use to deter rats and the damages they cause in your home.

Why Get Rid Of Rats?

Rats are no doubt interesting creatures but this does not mean you would want to keep them in your house for any length of time. The reason for this is simple, if you give them an inch, they will grab a yard. Rats are highly destructive pests and will chew their way through wire cables, fabrics, foods, or any other useful material in the house.

Besides this, they pose great health risks because they transmit several types of diseases. This is the reason you have to look through different pest control options and find what works best to get rid of rats in your house.

What Are The Things That Attract Rats?

Getting rid of rats may not be an easy task because they are hardy rodents. They are capable of thriving under different climates and conditions. This hardiness is also seen in the way they eat. They can feed on different types of things including human food and even those things such as garbage that humans will not feed on.

Rats will frequent places where they can get a constant supply of food and you should understand how easy this is for them with their strong sense of smell. The first step you want to take in rat prevention in your home is making sure to avoid those things that get rats attracted to your home in the first place.

Tips To Avoid The Smells That Attract Rats

Ensure that garbage bins are closed

The look and smell of decaying groceries and leftover food may be gross to you but this is exactly what rats need to keep coming back. The waste disposal unit may not be coming every day but you can keep the bad smell out hence the rats by ensuring that the garbage bins are closed properly.

Seal up cracks and holes

Rats are small animals and you will forever wonder how they managed to come inside your house if all doors and windows are shut tight. Rats can squeeze themselves through small holes, gaps, and cracks in the house, especially if they are bigger than one-quarter of an inch. As long as you still have these entry points, getting the doors and windows closed might not keep them out.

Maintain a clean environment

You will need to ensure that you maintain a clean environment and do away with piles of materials near your houses such as bricks, vegetation, firewood, or any other form of cluster of materials. These can easily serve as a haven that rats need to breed and eventually extend their territories into your home.

Can Odours Be Used To Repel Rats?

Several types of pest control methods have been introduced for getting rid of rats but only a few of them are effective in keeping these small pests away from homes. One interesting fact we know of is that a lot of people cannot differentiate between rats and mice. Rats are bigger and while cats may easily scare away mice, the story may change with rats.

Rats rely heavily on their sense of smell which they use in finding food and communicating with other rats around them. Since rats perceive smells and odours a lot, this ability may be used against them in producing a rat repellent. Scientific evidence lends support to this fact although realistically, effective prevention of rat infestation using this approach is often debated.

Here is the list of the top items whose smells are believed to keep rats away:

• Mothballs
• Garlic
• Peppermint oil

You may have heard as well about the use of one or more of these items but it is about time you learnt the truth on whether these materials can give off odours strong enough to ward off rats.

Can Mothballs Be Effectively Used To Fight Off Rats?

The effectiveness of mothballs as a means of rat control is doubted but many people to this day swear by this method. The primary reason mothballs are used as a rat prevention method is that they contain an active ingredient known as naphthalene. With this active ingredient, mothballs have been used to discourage the proliferation of fabric pests such as silverfish or moths. While this may have worked in this manner, it looks unrealistic to believe it will do the same with rats.

Several people believe that placing some balls or grains of mothballs at the entry points of rats or in their nest will be enough to get rid of them. However, what we know is that the amount of naphthalene in mothballs will never be enough to effectively keep rats away. Rats are smart and if they find the smell of mothballs worrisome, rest assured that they will seek out another route or access road.

Garlic Should Work Against Rats, Even Vampires Detest It

Garlic is one of the simple home remedies suggested for curbing the menace of a rat infestation in the home. Many people have found out that garlic is quite effective in controlling pests like flies and mosquitoes. However, it is not clear yet whether you can rely on it to help you keep a rat infestation out as no proof is available that it is effective at keeping rodents out of your home.

Garlic is well known for its strong aroma and this may make it seem like a great rat deterrent. There is no scientific evidence to back up the claim of rats being affected by the smell of garlic. Another thing is, if for any reason rats find the odour coming from an area offensive, if the area provides them the food they want, they are bound to return as soon as they become used to the pungent smell.

The Peppery Smell Of Peppermint Oil Should Do The Trick

If you believed it when you were told that rats dislike the smell of peppermint, you couldn’t have been more wrong. Your house may smell a lot better with peppermint oil spray but that does not mean it will make rats hate coming around your house for dinner.

It is believed that peppermint oil has a strong smell that keeps rats away from homes when used in high concentration, and this should be capable of distracting the keen sense of smell of rats easily.

You should bear in mind that rats are capable of surviving in places with more terrible smells such as stinky sewage for example. It becomes impractical therefore to make such places smell of peppermint oil. As soon as the peppermint oil disappears, these pesky critters are bound to make a return.

Which Is The Best Way To Keep Rats Away?

Most home remedies for getting rid of rats are appealing because they appear easy and are affordable. However, where there is a serious rat infestation, they do not provide a permanent or long-term solution to the problem.

More than any other thing as far as repelling rats is concerned, prevention stands as the best remedy. This should not be too difficult for you to do if you can follow these steps:

Regular maintenance of your home

If you would love to keep rats out of your domain, one of the best ways you can get this done is by making regular repairs to any form of damage that may have occurred in the exterior and interior sections of your house. This way, you get to seal up any crack or hole that may provide easy access to rats to gain entry into your home.

Keep your house clean

Maintaining a clean house is highly essential and needed to keep rats at bay. This is because rats get attracted by poor sanitary conditions. With their good sense of smell, rats can find their way to where there are decaying organic material because such is seen as food for them. By keeping waste in sealed containers and properly discarding food, your home will be less attractive to these pests.

Find A Pest Control Expert

Where there is neither the time nor the knowledge of how issues may be handled with a serious rat infestation, the next best thing you can do is to find a pest control expert such as Pest Aid. Such people will take the trouble off your hands and get the job done as quickly as possible.