Rodent Control Services in Midtown Hoboken, NJ

Row houses share more than a wall

Most midtown buildings were built touching their neighbors on both sides. Over the years, plumbers, electricians and cable installers have drilled through those party walls, floors and ceilings, and very few of the holes were ever filled properly. Each one is a doorway for a mouse.

That is why a midtown mouse problem often comes back after a tenant traps a few. The source is next door, or in the cellar the two buildings share, and the gap that lets them through is still open.

Where we look in a midtown brownstone

We work from the cellar up. Inside a typical midtown house, the places that matter most are:

• the front cellar, under the stoop, where old service openings were closed with wood that has since rotted
• the point where the main water and gas lines come through the foundation wall
• the rear of the building, where kitchen plumbing stacks run from the basement to the top floor
• the gap behind the baseboard along the party wall on each floor

Most of these openings are small. A mouse can pass through a hole about the width of a pencil, so the job is mostly careful, patient sealing. At Hoboken Rodent Control we use steel and masonry materials for that, not foam alone. The detail is on our rodent exclusion page.

Owners, tenants and condo associations

Many midtown brownstones have been split into two to four condos or rentals. Rodents do not care where one unit ends and the next begins, so a fix in one apartment rarely lasts unless the building agrees on a plan. We are glad to explain what we found to the whole association, not only the person who called.

If you are not sure yet whether you are dealing with mice or rats, start with a rodent inspection. Mouse-specific steps are covered on our mouse control page.

Winter is when midtown hears them

Steam and hot-water radiators are still common in midtown brownstones, and the pipes that feed them run warm through the walls from fall into spring. Mice settle along those warm runs. Tenants often first notice them in the colder months as a light pattering inside the wall beside the radiator, or a rustle in the ceiling late at night.

Gaps around the radiator pipe where it comes up through the floor are among the most useful things to close in these houses. They are easy to overlook because they sit behind the radiator itself, and the escutcheon plate that once covered the hole is often missing or loose. A few minutes with the right material there can stop a whole floor's worth of traffic.