What’s Crawling Around in Your Home’s Air Ducts?

It’s unpleasant to consider, but sometimes dust isn’t all that is in your duct system. You may hear animal noises coming from air ducts and notice you have unwanted visitors. You can try and lure the little guys out but if they’re nesting they may not leave their babies. Call Climate Control Service Experts for a thorough duct cleaning and we will confirm your duct system is free of all these uninvited house guests, including: 

Creepy-Crawlies 

Nothing is worse than trying to kill a spider and watching it run into your air vent. You can’t get to it now and all you can do is lie in bed and imagine it laying all those spider babies. You may even think you hear a few scampering around your duct system. Don’t worry. Climate Control Service Experts will come out and give you a full duct cleaning and make sure that spider and any of her bug friends are good and gone. Babies, too. 

Rodents 

When rats, squirrels, and other wildlife make their way into your duct system, usually through holes in the duct work and cracks in the foundation or home exterior, it causes multiple issues. First, squirrels, mice, or raccoons can leave droppings behind and can destroy anything they come across, including Christmas decorations or old toys you’re keeping in your attic. Second, those little guys tend to chew, which can cause exposed wiring. That joined with the dried grass and leaves they’re likely bringing in to build a nest, and now you have quite the fire hazard in your duct system, your attic, or behind your walls. A full duct cleaning can remove rodent droppings or nests, but you may also need to call animal control to remove the rodents and possibly an electrician if there has been any damage to wiring. 

Birds 

Birds usually get into safe and dry places to nest, like your air vents. Nests mean babies, which means they are feeding babies, and that means BUGS. If you have birds in your vents, you’ll presumably end up with bugs in your home. But that’s not the worst part. Birds construct nests in your vents, and given the vast amount of stuff they use to construct said nest, it can end up fully clogging a vent, preventing any airflow. As with rodents, a full duct cleaning from Climate Control Service Experts can remove any droppings, feathers, or other potential illness-carrying leave-behinds. You may also need animal control to actually remove the birds from your vents or attics. 

Mice in Air Ducts 

If you’ve got mice in your ductwork, you should take steps quickly to remove them. Mice chew through wires and leave droppings like most rodents, but they also multiply quickly. And when they run around in the ducts, treating it like the highway of your home, they may die in there. This creates an unsanitary situation, and you may notice an unsavory odor. 
 
You might suspect mice because of the sounds you hear – lots of scratching and scrabbling inside metal. Or you may actually spot one making an escape through the vents in your home. You may even confirm their passage by inspecting the ducts for mice droppings. Either way, if you suspect mice you have two options. You could trap them yourself, by placing traps just inside each duct and checking them each morning. Or you could contract a professional exterminator. 
 
Once you’ve determined that the mice are gone, you will need to have your ducts professionally cleaned by an HVAC company. If mice have been living in the walls, they will have left droppings in your ducts. Mice droppings are toxic, and if you leave them in your ducts they can make your household sick. Climate Control Service Experts offers duct cleaning services that will clean out most debris from your home’s airways. 

Call Climate Control Service Experts today or schedule online for a complete duct cleaning to help make sure the air your family is breathing is healthy and pest-free.