Another crazy hidden way rats are getting in an attic

Jan 3

The video below was taken earlier today in Benicia, CA. Here in the Bay Area there was a company that was popular for many years that used to install metal roofs over pre-existing roofs, largely wood shake roofs. It was a great selling point, you have a roof that can literally catch on fire and you live in California where there are a ton of fires. Put a metal roof on and you don’t have to remove the old roof! I imagine that was the pitch, I don’t know for sure, I was too young to own a house back then.

Nevertheless, these roofs now pose a unique problem for rodent extermination and exclusion. Normally for exclusion we want to have access to all areas, or at least as close as we can. These roofs are extremely easy to bend so we try to not walk on them making a huge inaccessible area! The other massive problem is because they were installed over a pre-existing roof there is now a huge void between the new metal roof and the old wood shake roof allowing an awesome highway system for rodents if they can find a way to get inside the first metal layer.

Now back to the inspection from today. We had trees overhanging the roof line (a literal ladder for the rats), a metal roof over shake and tons of rat droppings in the attic. The owner used to trap 5 or 6 every other year but now he’s renting it out and can’t do the trapping himself. So, all we can do is seal the best we can in the attic, suggest he trim the trees, set traps and bait stations around the property and monitor. It’s very rare that we can’t put a house on a full warranty meaning if the rats come back we come back to re-inspect, seal, trap etc. but this is one of those rare times.