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What is the Difference Between Rat and Mouse Droppings?
Other than catching a rat or a mouse red handed as it scurries through your home or business, the most obvious sign that you have rodent invaders is their droppings.
If you know how to identify rodent droppings, you’ll be able to tell whether you have rats or mice and take the appropriate action.
How to identify mice and rat droppings
“If it’s rice, it’s mice.”
Remember this rhyme and you’ll always be able to tell the difference between mice and rat droppings. As you might guess, mice droppings are roughly the size and shape of a grain of rice, with a dark brown/black colour.
Rat droppings have more of a sausage shape and are much larger, between ¼ and ½ an inch. Rats also defecate in smaller quantities, around 40 times a day, while mice leave behind 50-80.
If you’re unsure whether you have found droppings or something else, you can gather them with a wet paper towel. If they leave a brown stain, they’re droppings.
Where to find mice and rat droppings
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Both rats and mice urinate and defecate almost constantly as they explore, and even more so when they’re feeding or marking their territory.
This means that if rats or mice have been in your home or business, they’ll almost always leave behind evidence. The more droppings you find, the more rodents are about, or the longer they’ve been there.
To find droppings, you should check along the routes which rats and mice prefer to take through a building, such as along the edges of walls and skirting boards or behind/beneath kitchen units and furniture.
Mice leave their droppings in lines behind them as they move, while rats are more likely to cluster theirs together.
If you’re still unsure of what rodent you’re dealing with, or if you’ve found other evidence during your investigation, feel free to send us photos at [email protected] and we can help you identify your pests.
How to tell the difference between mouse and rat droppings
- Mouse droppings are about the size of a grain of rice and leave behind 50-80 a day wherever they go.
- Rats leave ¼ to ½ an inch long sausage-shaped droppings, around 40 a day in small piles.
- Behind kickboards, beneath/behind appliances and along the edges of skirting boards are all common locations for rodent droppings.
- You can confirm if they’re droppings by seeing if a wet paper towel is stained brown when placed on top of them.
Found droppings? Call us now
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