The winter months bring rodents indoors. Make sure you know how to protect your car from mice damage!
When temps go down, mice will find a cozy place in your car to hide out. In the winter, your garaged vehicle is the perfect place for mice to live. Your car insulates mice from the cold and protects them from predators.
As car-owner, you’ve probably dealt with auto accidents, expensive repairs or imagined worst-case scenarios such as theft or vandalism, but you rarely think about the extensive damage that can be caused by mice living in your car.
Mice and other rodents love to chew wiring, and your cars’ wiring is no exception. Mice will also build nests, causing clogs in intake manifolds, around air filters, and hide food inside your engine. Not to mention the urine and feces they leave behind, causing odor and bacteria to seep inside your car if located near your cabin air filter.
The most extensive damage mice can do usually involves the wiring. The danger with faulty wiring in your vehicle could mean having a brake light or turn signal that goes out to having crucial safety sensors that don’t work properly or even wiring that catches fire.
How to Prevent Mice Damage to Your Car
If you’ve ever had to pay for costly repairs on your car as the result of mice damage, you probably don’t want to have to do that ever again. As the saying goes, an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure. Here are steps you can take to prevent mice damage to your car.
- Keep dog food and birdseed out of the garage. Mice love food sources, so removing anything mice can eat will discourage them from moving in.
- Store garbage bins outside in tight containers
- Park your car in a rodent-free area. If you suspect there are mice or rodents on your property, it’s best to get rid of them sooner rather than later. Rural locations and areas that are heavily wooded are perfect places for field mice. Contact a wildlife removal specialist to assist with safe, effective rodent removal
- Seal up any holes in your garage to prevent mice from entering
- Block any entrances to your cars’ engine with wire screen. You can also try wrapping your car’s wiring in rat-proof tape.
- Use peppermint oil on cotton balls. Mice are not fond of the pungent smell. You’ll want to replace them often for potency and effectiveness.
- Install an electronic rat repellent device that emits a noise that is very annoying to rodents, but humans can’t hear it.
- Set up traps to catch the mice, but make sure you use proper handling and cleaning methods. If you aren’t comfortable trapping the mice yourself, you can hire a local wildlife removal professional to trap the mice for you and provide rodent exclusion service to prevent further invasion.