Rat Control in Algiers, New Orleans, LA

Algiers Point has some of the oldest housing in the city, raised on piers with deep galleries and mature trees, and the levee and riverfront sit right behind it. Further out through Old Aurora and English Turn the housing gets newer, but the riverfront and drainage pressure stays.

Historic raised housing at the Point

Algiers Point housing is largely nineteenth-century, raised on brick piers, with galleries, shutters and roof detail that gives a roof rat plenty to climb. Underneath, the pier space is open or lightly skirted, which is exactly what a Norway rat wants. As on the east bank, a lot of jobs here run top and bottom together.

The age of the wood matters. Old cypress and pine that has weathered for a century, plus Formosan termite damage in places, gives a rat something soft to chew at the fascia, the skirting and around the door thresholds.

Levee and riverfront pressure

The levee, the batture and the working riverfront hold a long-established outdoor rat population with cover, water and food. Properties on the streets nearest the levee take more pressure than those set further back, and no amount of trapping on your own lot changes what lives out there. Sealing does.

Newer Algiers

Out through Old Aurora, Tall Timbers and toward English Turn the housing is mostly post-war slab and low-raised construction on larger lots. The entry points shift to slab-edge burrowing, utility penetrations, garage door corners and attic vents, and mature yard growth is often what carries rats up to the roof.

Old cypress, termite damage and easy chewing

Algiers Point housing is largely old-growth cypress and pine, and a century and a half of weather has softened the exposed lumber: fascia boards, rafter tails, skirting, door thresholds and porch framing. Formosan termite damage in the same members makes it softer still.

For a rat, that is the difference between a gap it has to find and a gap it can make. A sound board takes real effort. A board that termites have hollowed and weather has opened takes a night.

That is why exclusion on these houses often includes some carpentry. Replacing a rotted fascia section or a chewed skirting board before covering it with hardware cloth is the difference between a repair that holds for years and one that gets chewed around by spring.

What the work covers in Algiers

The service is the same wherever you are in the metro, and the emphasis shifts with the building. On a raised house it leans toward the pier space and the floor penetrations. On a slab house it leans toward the slab edge, the garage door and the roofline. Either way it starts with an inspection and ends with the building sealed.

• Rat Removal: Trapping and removal for an active rat problem, from the first inspection through the last check of the traps.
• Rat Prevention & Exclusion: Sealing the gaps rats use to get in, from the roofline down to the pier space, so the problem does not repeat.
• Infestation Treatment: A full plan for an established infestation: heavy trapping, sealing, sanitation and follow-up until the building is quiet.
• Roof Rat Control: The climbing rat that gets into New Orleans attics from tree limbs, palms and power lines. Handled from the roofline down.
• Rat Inspection: Finding the species, the entry points and the runways, so the work that follows is aimed at the right places.
• Rat Trapping: Traps placed where rats actually travel, then checked and reset on a schedule until the building goes quiet.

Get a rat problem in Algiers looked at

Call 504-395-3296 and describe what you are hearing and where you are hearing it. Overhead after dark points one way, under the floor points another, and that changes what gets inspected first. You get upfront pricing and no obligation before any work starts.