Every year we hear about the best North American cities to live in. There seems to be a never-ending procession of city lists regularly released including cities with the best quality of life, highest average salary, best access to nature and more. But the so-called ‘rattiest’ cities? That’s a list that nobody wants to appear on. Rodents are incredibly crafty and reproduce at an alarming rate. They can destroy the foundation of your home, carry disease and steal your food.

Scurrying down sidewalks and invading homes, rats have quickly become a problem throughout all of Toronto. In fact, of the top five Canadian cities with a rat problem, Toronto ranks number one. Let’s have a look at the rodent challenge the city is facing, why there are more rats now than ever before, and how Skedaddle’s humane wildlife removal services throughout Toronto can help.

Toronto’s Rodent Challenge 

Toronto is one of Canada’s largest cities, and so perhaps high rodent numbers aren’t entirely unexpected. However, in the space of the last year, it has seen an unprecedented increase in rodent presence in the city. More homes and businesses are being overrun with rodents than ever before in a record year for animal control experts.

The COVID pandemic is the main explanation for the rat explosion. Due to restaurants’ limitations and reduced hours, rats do not have a steady food supply to rely on, leading them to more residential neighbourhoods. Typically, rats will only attempt to make the move indoors during the colder winter months. When their summer homes were no longer desirable, they had no option but to seek warm shelter inside of homes.

It has also been noted that rats are infiltrating more attics than ever before. While they’re constantly lauded as intelligent, this is still a remarkable observation: rats have learned that the ground is a far less safe option than lofts and attics throughout the city. Rats can swim for miles and sneak through holes the size of a quarter – they’ll take any opportunity to work their way into your home. This is why there’s such a big rat problem city-wide.

Why You Don’t Want Rats in Your Home

There isn’t much more unsettling noise than the sound of rats scuttling around in your home. Whether they’re in your walls, climbing up pipes or creating nests in your attic, hearing the rats without seeing them is enough to scare anyone.

They’re also famously fast reproducers. A female rat can give birth as little as 21 days after becoming pregnant, and conceive all over again within a week. Within a month, a new litter of 6-8 baby rats could be running around your house and if there are females in that litter too, the problem will get out of hand quickly.

Rats are known to cause expensive structural damage to your home; floors, foundation, and insulation all suffer from the rats chewing and droppings. If they chew through wires – determined to nest inside your home – they could be creating serious fire hazards. They’re notorious for carrying disease as well. Many of them will bring bacteria and parasites into your home, and some of them will even bring sewage from around the city too.

How Can Skedaddle Protect Your Home? 

Sure, there are a number of DIY steps you can attempt when trying to protect your home from a rodent infestation, but these methods can be ineffective or harmful to rodents and other unsuspecting animals. There’s no better method of protecting your Toronto home than contacting Skedaddle – our humane wildlife control strategies will ensure that rodents are removed safely and efficiently. Not only do we remove, but also we identify entry points and future-proof your home against any further infestations as well.