Mouse control in Plano, Texas

Most Plano mouse problems start in the kitchen. Somebody pulls out the drawer under the oven and finds droppings, or the dog won't stop staring at the gap under the dishwasher. House mice are small, gray-brown and quiet. Texas A&M AgriLife training material says a mouse needs a hole about the size of a dime, or a crack about a quarter inch wide.

In a slab house they usually come in at ground level. The garage door seal is the most common spot, then the gaps around the AC line set, the dryer vent and the hose bib where the pipe goes through the brick. Once they're in the garage, the door into the kitchen and the gap around the water heater flue are next. If you're hearing heavier running overhead, that's more likely roof rats.

Mouse control has two halves. Trapping removes the mice already inside. Sealing keeps the next ones from walking in through the same gap. A job that skips the second half usually ends with another call in a couple of months.

Signs you have mice and not something bigger

Mouse droppings are about an eighth to a quarter inch long, dark and pointed at the ends. A single mouse leaves a lot of them, so a few in the silverware drawer means mice have been around for a while. Other things people notice:

• A chewed corner on the cereal box or the dog food bag
• Light scratching inside the wall by the fridge after dark
• A nest of shredded paper towel under the sink
• Droppings on the garage shelf next to the grass seed
• A stale, musky smell in the pantry that wasn't there last month

What a thorough mouse job includes

A good provider treats the house as a whole. Ask whether the quote covers each of these:

• An inspection of the kitchen, pantry, laundry, garage and attic, plus a walk around the slab outside
• Snap traps set along the walls where mice actually travel, out of reach of kids and pets
• Any bait kept outside in locked, anchored stations, never loose in the house
• Every gap at ground level closed with metal mesh, flashing or hardware cloth backed by sealant
• Weep vent covers on the brick, if the weep holes are open
• One or two return visits to check traps and confirm activity has stopped

Step by step

The technician looks before setting anything. They check the garage, the kitchen, the pantry, under the sinks and the attic, then walk the outside of the house looking low along the slab and up at the roofline. Fresh droppings and rub marks tell them where the mice are traveling.

Traps go along those runways the same day. Mice don't range far from the nest, so traps set a few feet apart in the right room work better than a dozen scattered around the house. Loose pellets inside the house are a bad idea, because mice die in the walls and the smell lasts for weeks.

Then the gaps get closed with material mice can't chew through: steel or copper mesh packed tight, metal flashing, hardware cloth and sealant over the top. Expanding foam on its own won't hold. On the follow-up visit the technician pulls the traps, checks for new droppings and looks at any spot that was hard to seal. The entry point sealing page goes deeper on materials.

Why mice are a steady problem in Plano

Most Plano houses went up between the 1970s and the 2000s: brick veneer over wood framing, on a slab, with an attached garage that often opens onto a back alley. A slab means no crawl space, which helps. It doesn't stop mice. They follow the edges: the bottom of the garage door, the corners where the door meets the jamb, the spot where the brick ledge meets the slab, and every pipe and wire that goes through the wall.

Plano also kept a lot of creek corridors and greenbelts as it grew. Houses that back onto them see field mice testing the garage every fall when the grass dries out. Older homes in East Plano and around Los Rios tend to have worn seals and dried caulk. The newer two-stories in Deerfield usually leak at the garage and where the second-floor roof meets the first.

Collin County clay matters too. It swells when it's wet and shrinks in August, and over the years that movement pulls caulk away from pipes and opens hairline gaps along the slab edge.

• Garage door bottom seals and the side weatherstrip
• AC line set, gas line and cable entries
• Dryer vent flaps that hang open
• Weep holes in the brick veneer
• The gap around the water heater flue in the garage ceiling

When you can handle it yourself

One mouse in the garage that you caught the next night? You might be fine. Put pet food, bird seed and grass seed in metal or hard plastic bins with lids, fix the garage door seal and keep a couple of snap traps along the wall where the dog can't reach. The traps article covers which ones work.

If you keep catching mice week after week, the gap they're using is still open. That's the point where a technician earns the fee. If they've been in the attic insulation for a while, ask about droppings cleanup too.

Related reading

• Mice in the walls: how to find them and stop them
• Rat vs. mouse droppings: how to tell them apart
• The best rat and mouse traps, and how to use them

Related services: Entry Point Sealing, Mice in the Walls, Garages, Sheds and Cars

Service areas: West Plano, East Plano, Downtown Plano, Legacy West and Legacy, Willow Bend, Los Rios, Hunters Glen, Deerfield, Russell Creek, Allen, Richardson, Murphy, Frisco, Wylie, Parker, Carrollton, The Colony.