Home Sharing with Pests

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“There are mice droppings in the kitchen”, my tenant says. OMG. My heart dropped. “Do I really have to deal with this?” I think to myself. In 14 years, I have never seen or heard a mouse. Maybe because we had cats and even when they died, their friends liked to visit our property. Perhaps, the cats stopped coming by because they have finally passed on too. Losing pets and friends is hard.

Pests on the other hand are not as lovable. Every fall the crickets take up residence and then disappear. Spider webs appear after 1 week of not dusting, so spiders must lurk in the shadows. Ants seem to prefer the spring season. Mosquitoes and flies in the summer are the worst. Squirrels in the attic? Hell. Wasps and bees seem to find their way into the smallest hole. Racoons and foxes have seasonal reservations for the space under our deck, though they only come out at night. I love spotting them on my security cameras; their eyes glow brightly in the grayscale night images.

The exterminator has set traps, sprayed and strategically planted poison. I’m actually non-violent and so I struggle with terminating the life of God’s creatures for my comfort. But I like comfort. So I seek natural and non-violent ways to discourage pests from sharing my space. A blowing fan push flying insects away from my personal space. Mint scented garbage bags deter the rodents from turning over the garbage cans. I’m trying out ultrasonic wave devices to repel the mice and other small critters from their cozy indoor digs, so that they just voluntarily move away because the sound waves annoy their nervous systems. It’s a humane method for removing pests and costs less than 4 cans of bug spray! Can I use the device for telemarketing calls? Unfortunately not; it doesn’t affect humans or robot callers. Shucks.