Metairie is mostly post-war slab and low-raised housing on established lots, and the mature trees that have grown up around those houses over sixty years are now touching a lot of rooflines. Roof rats in the attic are the most common call here, with Norway rats along the canal lines and drainage.

Mature yards put rats on the roof

A Metairie house built in 1960 with the original oak or pecan out front now has limbs across the roof. Add the palms, the heavy shrubs planted against the wall and the fence line running up to the eave, and a roof rat has several ways up. Once on the roof, it tests the soffit returns, the gable and turbine vents, and the junction where the patio or carport roof meets the wall.

Slab construction, ground-level entry

No pier space here on most homes, so Norway rats burrow along the slab edge and come in through the gaps that slab houses have: weep holes and the space behind brick veneer, AC line penetrations, dryer vents, plumbing chases, and the bottom corners of garage doors, which are the single most reliable failure point on a slab home.

Attached garages and utility rooms are often occupied before the house is, so if you are hearing something in the garage, do not wait for it to move inside.

Canals and drainage through the parish

The 17th Street Canal, the Soniat and Elmwood drainage lines and the pump network give Norway rats protected routes across Jefferson Parish, and heavy rain pushes them out toward buildings. Properties backing onto a canal or drainage right of way take steady pressure regardless of season.

Attics, pull-down stairs and the hatch you never open

On a Metairie slab house the attic is usually reached by a pull-down ladder in a hallway or garage, and it is often opened once or twice a year. That is long enough for a roof rat population to establish, nest in the insulation and start on the wiring without anyone seeing it.

Worth doing twice a year: put your head up with a flashlight and look along the top plates and the eaves. You are looking for droppings concentrated in lines, tunneling or flattened tracks through the insulation, and any point where daylight is visible at the eave.

Check the hatch itself too. Pull-down stair frames rarely seal well against the ceiling, which is how attic dust, insulation fibres and rodent odour end up in the hallway below. Weatherstripping the frame is cheap and makes the attic easier to keep separate from the house.

What the work covers in Metairie

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 Metairie 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.

Rat Control in Metairie, LA