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Controlling rodents in grain processing and handling facilities [Podcast]

Discover why rodent management in grain facilities demands more than seasonal attention.

Fg Podcast Steven
Transcript

Join Steven Kilger, host of the Feed & Grain Podcast, as he hosts Dr. Mike Bentley, VP of Training and Technical Services for the National Pest Management Association. This episode delves into the critical issue of rodent control in feed and grain facilities.

Key topics covered:

  • Why grain facilities attract rodents
  • Signs of rodent infestation to watch for
  • Innovative technologies for effective rodent control

Gain valuable insights to protect your facility and maintain industry standards. Stay informed with the latest in feed manufacturing and grain handling practices.

Transcript

Steven Kilger - 00:02

Hello, my name is Steven Kilger. I'm the managing editor of Feed & Grain magazine and the host of the Feed &Grain podcast. Thank you so much for joining me today as we dive deep into the issues affecting the feed manufacturing, grain handling, and allied industries.

Today’s episode is brought to you by The BinWhip from Pneumat Systems. The powerful Dual Impact BinWhip removes the toughest buildup and blockages in industrial storage silos – without hazardous silo entry. Learn more today at binwhip.com.

My guest today is Dr. Mike Bentley. He's the Vice President of Training and Technical Services for the National Pest Management Association. Mike is here to talk about rodents and facilities that handle grain. We're going to discuss how feed and grain facilities make the perfect home for rodents, signs of rodent infestation to look out for, and technology that might help you enhance your facility's rodent control.

I hope you enjoyed the interview. If you want to help with a podcast and are listening to this in a podcasting app, please rate us and subscribe. If you are listening online, sign up for the feed-in grain newsletter, Industry Watch, to see the newest podcast drops and stay up to date with all the news from around the industry. Now, onto the show.

Kilger - 01:15

Hi Mike, thanks so much for joining me today. I really appreciate it.

Mike Bentley - 01:20

Yeah, absolutely. Thank you so much for inviting me to be on.

Kilger - 01:22

For anyone who might not know you, would you mind just telling the audience a little bit about what you do and who you are?

Bentley - 01:30

Sure, so my name is Mike Bentley, I'm the Vice President of Training and Technical Services for the National Pest Management Association. Our association represents the structural pest control industry, so those folks that will show up to help to maintain a healthy and pest-free facility, those are the folks that are part of our industry. I've got about 20 years of experience in the industry. That's combined with both research and development, as well as applied experience actually working with a pest management firm. But professionally, I am a professionally trained entomologist. I've got both a master's and a PhD in entomology, one focused on medical and veterinary pests, and then my PhD is focused on invasive species management. So, a little bit of everything, I've done everything from help to make the stuff that we use to control the pests, all the way down to the R&D side of better understanding the pests that we manage.

Bentley - 02:28

And then lastly, actually working with a pest management firm, both on the technical side, out in the field on the applied side, as well as actually managing a company.

Kilger - 02:37

Masters and PhD. I get to be a journalist with a bachelor's today. I'm always at awed with people who stuck with it so much longer, did so much more math and science than I would be willing to do.

Bentley - 02:51

All that translates to a lot of time talking about bugs, so it's a super degree in nerdism is what I've got.

 Kilger - 02:59

So, we have you on here today because it is that time of year where mice and other rodents become a lot more prevalent in, well, everywhere. I get them in my house at this time of year, a little field mice sneak in. And for our industry, they also happen to be sitting on A couple hundred thousand tons of the ideal food source for those rodents, so it can get pretty bad this time of year. Can you tell me a little bit about what some of the most common rodent species are that industrial facilities really have to worry about, especially this time of year?

Bentley - 03:36

Yeah, absolutely. And I mean, you know, there's probably not going to be a lot of shock and all whenever I say that mice are probably house mice in particular are going to be the number one rodent species that most folks operating in facilities, these grain facilities are going to be running into. But, you know, I think it's always good to kind of put a frame of reference around what we're talking about. And mice in particular, because they tend to be the smallest of those commensal rodent species that we deal with, They epitomize the tiny but mighty slogan in the title. You know, worldwide rodents represent about $30 billion annually in food losses. So when we're talking about a single mouse or a rat in a grain facility, we're talking about the perpetrator that represents one of the largest economic and public health impacts to our industry in grain facilities around the world. So $30 billion a year in food loss is attributed just to rodents.

They are also responsible for damaging about 20% of the world's food supply. Unimaginably large. And a lot of that damage actually comes during the pre-harvest period. So we're talking about from farm to processing facility long before it ever makes it to packaging. So pre-harvest losses, most of that happens in that 20% of loss of the world's food supply. And to kind of help to put into perspective just what that 20% means, if we take the slice of pie of that 20% of the world's food supply that's damaged and we just take the Asia slice out, We take 6% of Asia's food supply of the pre-harvest losses for Asia alone. That represents enough food to feed about 220 million people for a year.

And if we were to convert that 220 million people into a country, it would be the seventh largest country in the world. So tiny but mighty, these little tiny mice represent a huge public health and economic threat to feed and grain businesses. So it is absolutely imperative that I love that we're talking about them now. It's a really easy to overlook pest, but it is one of the most damaging pests that we deal with in these facilities. And of them, the smallest one tends to be the hardest one to deal with, and that is mice. So I think today we're probably going to spend quite a bit of time talking about mice, but whenever we do talk about rodents in general, in terms of the risks and threats they pose to these facilities, we're going to probably talk about mice, Norway rats, and roof rats kind of as a whole. Most of the facilities, from coast to coast, mice are going to be your biggest issue.

But depending on where those facilities are located, if you happen to be, let's say you're a facility that's closer to a large body of water or maybe a river, a major riverway, or even those coastal facilities, you may start to run into things like noray rats and roof rats, which universally not quite as common, but they certainly can show up in these facilities. And each one, mice, noray rats, roof rats, they all kind of bring their own Unique set of challenges to the table. There is no unfortunately one size fits all fix to just make everything go away. So there are some nuanced changes and details to kind of how you tackle and manage a facility infestation between the three groups.

Kilger - 07:11

Yeah, that makes sense to me. It also really makes sense to me that mice are actually the biggest problem, because a mouse is... I mean, no one wants a mouse nearby. It's not a fun thing. Well, some people like them, and some people find them cute, and they can be in certain angles, but they're small. You don't notice them right away. They scurry, and I mean, that's the old adage, right? That you see one mouse that you actually have dozens Yeah, no, that's exactly right.

Bentley - 07:37

Yeah, I mean, the reproductive capacity is through the roof. I mean, and it doesn't take them very long. I mean, given regular access to food and water, reproduction can happen year round, it does not have to follow a seasonal pattern. And guess where they have all of the food and water they need? In grain facilities, right? So Yeah, and the fact that they are small is kind of what makes them the biggest pain in the neck to deal with. They're easy to miss, they can set up shop in a really, really tiny space and if you can, I mean, they can fit through a gap, crack or crevice about the width of a number two pencil.

I mean, it is amazing how these things can compress their bodies and the things that they can fit through. I mean, the only way to describe it is impossibly small. It just does not seem like it would be physically possible. They are the magicians of the rodent world. They can literally squeeze through these tiny little gaps and cracks. So, if you can fit a number two pencil through an opening in a bay door or a loading area, they can also fit through. So, yeah.

Kilger - 08:41

And it's anyone who's dealt with mice in their home is probably realized as they try to go around and figure out where they're getting in and you don't see any holes or anything that somehow it's still here. Okay. With facilities, most of them are, you know, steel or concrete. And I think with rodents, like anything else, the best kind of, a good defense is the best offense, right? Like keeping them out of the facility in the first place is the best way to deal with any of these rodent infestations. How are they, what are the typical access points that mice or rats might find into a facility like this? What are the vulnerabilities and maybe like, how can we fix them?

Bentley - 09:22

That's a great question, and you hit the nail on the head. The best prevention is a good offense. Being proactive is really the key to maintaining a pest-free facility. If you wait until you have a rodent problem, then all you're doing is trying to play catch-up for however long it takes to resolve the issue, and sometimes that can be months. And by then, the damage is already done. So exclusion is always going to be key. Sanitation and exclusion are your two biggest measures to try to put in place.

 But like he said, I mentioned a number two pencil. I mean, imagine how many locations around a facility you can slide a number two pencil through or under. So, I mean, you know, every facility, even though they all kind of have the same stuff, they're all built a little bit differently. They handle things a little bit differently. Timing of deliveries and those sorts of things are all a little bit different, just different enough to create these nuanced changes and what one facility's vulnerability will be over another. But in general, you know, especially let's just talk about mice, it's easy to accidentally bring them into a facility. So one of the, I mean you could have the most perfectly excluded facility, but you probably still have large bay doors or service entrances that allow you to, that unfortunately sometimes get propped open and left open from time to time.

It doesn't take a door being propped open for a minute for you to run outside, grab a couple things, or for that one delivery where the hand struck coming in or the bay doors left open while things are being delivered and dropped off, and whether it's equipment, machinery, grain, One of the easy entry points for every rodent is every single structural entry point in the facility. So making sure that your facility crew all understands the risk that those things pose. And look, we can't materialize and push things through a wall, right? I mean, we have to have these openings. Making sure that doors don't stay open longer than they have to. No matter what the facility is, it's got bay doors.

 It's got entryways. Every single one of those structural entryways is a potential vulnerability. We all have them, right? The next probably most likely vulnerability for most facilities is going to be these granum loading areas. Open access If we're talking about exclusion being the name of the game, then you literally have an open access area. That's the way that it's built.

You can't create a closed system there, that's just the way that is, but being mindful of that being a potential primary entry point for rodents. Making sure that it remains Clean on a regular basis, clean on a regular basis, and even dust management, which I'm sure folks are pretty familiar with this, but it doesn't take, but I mean dust accumulation over a single week, you know, it doesn't take very long for dust to accumulate in areas to be enough to be enough food to testifies to not only attract rats and mice, but to stain rats and mice for one period of time.

Kilger - 12:45

Yeah, we think of it as waste is dust, right? But in reality, it's grain dust, so it's food.

Bentley - 12:51

Oh, absolutely. Yeah, absolutely. Especially when it accumulates and a little bit of humidity in the air, then it starts to, you know, solidify. And I mean, it's just, it's just the kind of the snowball rolling down the hill effect, right? So bringing the living areas are certainly going to be another major vulnerability. And just making sure that the entire area around there Remains clean. I know it seems like an impossible task to make sure that there's no free grain around there.

That's never going to happen. But just be mindful of that, knowing that is going to attract pests. And then any transport equipment that's responsible for bringing those grains from that offloading location to storage facilities, cleaning locations, silos. A lot of times those can be open act ups. When say you're kind of running into the same problem where rats and mice can get on this conveyor belt, now suddenly they've got a free carnival ride right into the silo, right?

Kilger - 13:48

Well, especially because you can't control necessarily what the situation is at the farm or whatever that's delivering you grain, like can't control their pest control management.

Bentley - 14:01

Exactly, exactly. And just being mindful of what's coming and going from your fertility. That's the last thing. I mean, like I said, everybody's taking deliveries, everybody's sending things out. That's just, I mean, that's how business operates. So being mindful of that, having a protocol in place to go through and do a quick inspection, look for activity of run-in issues, whether it's feces, chewing, those sorts of things. Giving everything a quick inspection, a little bit of investment in time can really go a long way in that area.

Kilger - 14:29

Yeah, and if you do have mice come in, I mean most facilities have kind of year-round Some kind of rodent trap, which is a bit of, I guess, an old-fashioned way, probably a really effective way of doing it, but I'm hearing more and more about the little sound things, but I don't think they actually work for anything. I've had them in my house and I've still had a mouse, so I don't think those work, but you get any, like, what they're calling mouse and rodent fertility control and other solutions out there. Is technology keeping up? Are we making a better mousetrap?

Bentley - 15:02

Yeah, so all right, so new technology for the industry. So yeah, let's go ahead and dispel a myth really quick. The acoustic devices are not a lot of evidence to suggest that those things are working. I think it's more, it possibly provides a peace of mind for the individual that has it plugged in, but a hungry mouse or rat is going to run right by that and it's not going to do much. So we do have the tried and true methods of sanitation, Exclusion. And then we have a list of chemical control means that are critical to maintaining a rodent-free facility. That's going to be things like rodenticides that are often deployed through tamper-resistant bait boxes.

And then also snap traps and other physical catch devices. All of those are fantastic. I will tell you that you mentioned the fertility treatments. I think one thing that's good for folks to keep in mind is there rarely is ever going to be one thing that is going to make all of your problems go away. So I think one thing to keep in mind is a lot of these tools work best when they're used in tandem. So let's say a fertility tool may not necessarily make every problem go away because while the rodents may be in Fertile It's not so much a new control tool, but it's a new device used to enhance our ability to monitor and control rodents, and that's electronic monitoring devices.

 And there is a wide range of different types of devices. Some of these devices are built into traps or rodent bait stations, where the station itself has this device built in. There are some that are designed to work to up-fit an existing bait station or snap trap. Essentially, what these devices do is they work off of cell phone towers or Wi-Fi signal. They all connect to a central hub that your pest management professional runs and they track and monitor activity around the facility. When you're there on site, you are the eyes and ears for the facility you are inspecting. When your pest management professional is there on that weekly or monthly visit, they are there providing inspection services and they're looking at recorded logs and those sorts of things.

 But electronic monitoring devices installed around a property provide 24 hour a day, 7 day a week surveillance. And they can instantly provide data on when an activity is detected in a station or a trap, or if a trap goes off. So they're providing around the clock, essentially surveillance of a property. And what this data can do is help to paint a picture of where there's hotspots, where there may be some vulnerabilities, where press pressures are higher on one side of a facility versus another. It's more data to help paint the picture of what the pest issues look like on that facility because even two facilities side by side are going to have different schedules, different way they handle sanitation and waste and grains and all sorts of things that are going to change The nature of how pests are entering the facility, what the pressures around that facility look like. These monitoring devices provide amazing data that can really help to dial that in, show different times of day when activity may be peaking, and you can dive into that, show different times of year, better ideas of seasonal information on seasonality of pest pressures.

And like I said, every year this stuff gets better. It used to kind of work off of Dedicated Wi-Fi signals, now these things are working off of more of like cell phone towers and things, or some of the devices are, so essentially they never lose signal. They can be logged into remotely to download data and activity reports, say, so an individual does not have to go to the site to download that data. As we start to see more and more AI, the integration of AI continue to grow, platforms are adding these AI capabilities in where they can interpret these huge amounts of data. And provide more meaningful feedback of prescriptive directions, seasonal predictions of what issues may come. We talked about having that good offense. Well, being able to forecast what pest pressures are going to happen and what problems you're going to be dealing with in the next three months is the best way to make sure that you are fully preparing a facility.

To stay pest-free during that seasonal period of time when pest pressure has historically been highest and will continue to be the highest. So really, really cool stuff with this remote monitoring technology. And like I said, every year it just continues to advance and get better. This has certainly been the area in our industry that we've seen the greatest technological leaps.

Kilger - 20:36

Yeah, I've never seen anything like that. It makes sense though, especially when you consider for any business, I mean, rodents are most active in the evening and at night, which is when you're not at the business. And also, during the day you have lights on, it's a feed or grain facility, there's plenty of little nooks and crevices to hide in behind machinery, all those places. You're probably not seeing a majority of the activity during the day, so something like this seems really useful to actually know what's going on. If you turn on a light and a bunch of rats or mice scatter away, you have a real problem.

Bentley - 21:15

It's easy for us to fill in the gaps with our own assumptions. And I would argue that if you are working at that facility and you're on site of that facility seven days a week, you are the facility's expert. But even the experts sometimes can, you know, we're assuming that the problem is over here because of this. Well, once you start to get this data, it really does. It's interesting to see how often we can, we get this data and it paints a picture that can differ from what we were assuming was the case. So pretty useful stuff.

Kilger - 21:47

Yeah, definitely. And that brings us kind of into my next question. What are the common mistakes or oversights you see with people who are trying to manage rodents in their business, their facility? Just not thinking about it enough? Is it not being vigilant enough? Being too content with the one mouse you see every couple of weeks and not doing anything about it? What do you kind of see people, what's the mistake you see people making?

Bentley - 22:14

Oh man, that's a good question. So, I think a couple of things come to mind. The first one is not hiring a professional to help maintain a rodent-free environment. I say that for a couple of different reasons. One, facility operators and managers have got a lot going on. It is a full-time job to run that facility. Adding rodent management to that list of things to do If it's going to be done right, that is also a full-time job.

And trying to bring somebody in to resolve the problem after it's already started is kind of starting behind the eight ball. So having somebody there that can ensure that the facility remains pest-free resolves issues that are current and ongoing. But also, I mean, one of the things I think is often overlooked for a professional bringing them in is They understand all the nuanced biology behavior of rodents and There's going to be different problems that pop up throughout the year. They're the professionals that provide consultation services as well. So they can come in and as your facility changes seasonally, changes yearly, those changes could inherently impact what kind of pest issues or pest pressures are going to be present or are currently present. They can provide advice on those changes and help to direct and prescribe pest prevention solutions for the facility. As those changes occur, Rather than waiting for some seasonal change to happen that then creates a pest issue than having to hire somebody to come in and deal with it later.

So we've already talked about the economic costs that are associated with rodent. So, I mean, the investment of bringing and having a professional working with you year round far outweighs the potential or the inevitable losses of whether it's the product itself or the time investment of having somebody there to deal with the stuff year round. So I think hiring a professional is one that often folks just kind of overlook, I could take care of this myself, I'm going to put some bait boxes out, it would be fine. There's oftentimes a lot more to it than that if you really want a rodent-free facility. And saying that, that kind of leads me to the next mistake, and that is it is very, very common for me to go to a facility and see when somebody is handling this work on their own, they don't have a pest management professional working with them. They will operate under the assumption that rodent bait boxes are there to protect an entryway. So oftentimes I will see two bait stations placed on either side of a bay door or maybe a front entry door and you know and they're within just a couple feet of those entryways and the assumption the incorrect assumption is being made by whoever placed in there the non-passimated professional is well these are going to protect the entryway.

In reality, what actually happens is you provide a nice little hidey hole for rats and mice and they have this nice protected spot where they can sit and wait until that door is open and then lightning quick bolt right into that facility. It can quickly become this easy access, like this safety spot, almost like a weigh station for them to come in Hang out and then go into the facility where they have access to food, water and shelter and all those sorts of things. So understanding what bait boxes are really for and maybe the best installation of those bait boxes is something I think a lot of people overlook and that assumption that having those bait stations installed on either side of the door is going to offer protection is probably the most common mistake I see on these facilities.

Kilger - 26:07

Yeah, well people deal with rodents and stuff, the personal residents and things like that. They probably make that assumption. Number one assumption I assume is like, rodents are just gonna be part of this. We're always gonna have them around, we can only control them a little bit, but other than that it's not that big a deal. And then the other one, which is, I do this at home. Saw my cat chasing a mouse the other day, I got him, I put down a trap. Probably do this large scale too, I'm not gonna pay money to get someone.

How long can a mouse or a rat really live if it has unlimited food and water? What's the life expectancy? Because even if you do a fertility treatment, and it's not fertile, it's still just hanging out Cause of eating your grain, causing mold problems, doing all these other things.

Bentley - 27:11

Yeah, absolutely. I mean, you know, certainly, I mean, you know, a lot of times when you see numbers thrown around about, you know, they can live up to, a lot of times those numbers are pulled from, hey, we put them in a laboratory environment where there was no, you know, predatory pressures or anything else, and they could survive for, you know, a year or more, those kinds of things. Yeah, usually life expectancy in the wild is a little bit shorter, but, you know, it's easily, you know, six months They develop very quickly, they grow very quickly, but a lot of that contamination from rodents comes from defecation. Defecation is one of the primary means of communication for rodents. When they find a good place that provides cover for them, Let's say that's a long covered wall that leads up to an exterior wall that leads up to a door and there's a lot of brush and overgrowth up against that wall. So they're going to regularly defecate along that wall and then once they find a nice covered corner, maybe it's inside of the facility under a storage rack or something.

You're going to find a lot of defecation there, maybe ceiling tiles, drop ceiling tiles, those kinds of things. These areas, the reason why there's so much defecation there is because there's pheromones in the feces and the urine, and these rodents use those pheromones to communicate with each other to let them know, hey, this is a safe space, so this is a good place to be at, and the more or regularly they use that runway or that Area under a storage rack the more likely they are to defecate and they're defecating dozens of times if not hundreds of times a day So even if we say hey this rodent only survived for three months you're talking thousands of defecation points And it doesn't take but you know a single day for them to defecate enough to contaminate large amounts of stores and food items so it's a They can certainly do a lot of damage in a little bit of time. You mentioned something too about cats that I think is worth pointing out because it's another common misconception. Dispel this myth. So, if I have cats on the property, they're taking care of my rodent issue, I don't need to worry about it because cats are excellent rodent hunters.

And they can be, and they probably are, but what they're not doing is Trapping out and catching out all of the rodents in your property. There was a study that was done a couple years ago where they RFID, they trapped rats on a facility, they RFID chipped them and then re-released them in the facility. It was a waste management facility and the purpose was to track and monitor rodent activity over a couple weeks period of time and they had video cameras running at the same time. And so the facility had a few cats on the premises. What they found was that when the cats would show up, the rodents would scurry and hide. So they could smell, they could detect when these cats were in the area and activity would essentially cease. So what was happening was the presence of cats were creating the illusion and create the illusion That they make rats and mice go away, because when they're around you don't see rats and mice, you may see them catch one every once in a while.

They're not actually catching and out-catching all of the rats and mice in the area. What they're doing is they're suppressing activity, so it creates the illusion that you don't have rats and mice then, but the cats have to sleep, the cats go hunt in other areas, and as soon as they move to the other side of the facility, rat and mouse activity picks right back up.

Kilger - 31:06

Well, yeah, especially if you're Feed &the cat. Cat's primary motivation for catching a rodent is hunger. I have a cat at home. When there are mice here, he tries to play with them. So I'll see him come up to me with a tail hanging out of his mouth and just drop it in the floor and start batting around. Not actually super helpful with the whole control part of things. So I guess there's a question I probably should have asked earlier.

Is it just the cold that brings rodents into facilities? Is it the safety? Is it a place to breed safely? I guess like what is the motivation around, especially this time of year, of rodents seeking to be inside versus staying outside?

Bentley - 31:52

Yeah, that's a great question. I think the simple answer is all of the above. They want a safe place. They are the bottom of the food chain. Everything is out to get them. They're looking for a safe place to hide. They're looking for a safe place to reproduce.

They're looking for a safe place to store food. And we tend to provide all of those things for them in most of our structures, particularly a structure where we have access to moisture. It's an enclosed structure and it has all of the food that could ever ask for. We do tend to see activity pick up seasonally, right? So as it starts to get colder, Lower temperatures do drive rodents indoors, but a lot of times people just kind of stop at that, oh it's cold so they're going inside, but there's a lot of other things that are happening there. One of the important things that really drives them into grain facilities in these areas where grain stores are held is because during the colder times of the year, most of their natural food sources are non-existent. So the insects, seed, everything else, grass seed, all these sorts of things, all of the other things that they could find for a food source outside of a feed and grain facility don't exist in the harsh bitter months of winter.

And they have evolved to know that as soon as the season approaches, food is about to get scarce. So they need to start looking for a place to hide, looking for a place to start storing food and to survive those food restricted months. And a lot of times folks wait until it's cold to start thinking about rodent protection. One other environmental factor that happens long before it starts to really get that cold is daylight starts to dwindle. So another environmental cue for rodents is shorter days, longer nights. And that typically happens before temperatures. I mean, it's, they're pretty close in tandem with each other, but you start to see shorter daylight period before you start to experience in most of the country, before you start to experience this, what we would register as a drop in temperature.

And that also is what cues in Insects due to hibernation, that's where plants stop producing seeds and all these other things. So their food stores start to actually dwindle, their natural availability of food resources starts to dwindle outside of these facilities. A little bit before temperatures start to drop and we start to see snowfall and those kinds of things. All of this stuff happens long before we start to think that the season for rodent activity is upon us, which further reinforces that this can be a year-round thing. But it is, there's environmental cues that drive them inside, there's a need to find food shelter and moisture, you know, find a nice safe place to reproduce all year long. And if they're in the wild, you know, they're in a field somewhere, reproduction is going to decline in those colder months just because they don't have enough food to feed the young. But if they're inside your facility, they can reproduce year round.

There is no seasonality reproduction whenever they have a full buffet of everything that they can ever ask for.

Kilger - 35:11

Yeah, it is something you don't think about, especially now when it, here in Wisconsin, was 80 degrees in October. So, you're not really thinking about, oh, the weather's changing, time to do an update on my rodent control plan. Well, that leads to my last question, which is, for someone who wants to upgrade the rodent control system, their plan, their action plan, whatever it is at their facility, a manager really wants to Take control of this

Bentley - 35:55

Probably the best advice I could give is if you're not working with a professional to consider working with one. I mean, especially if you're just getting ready to implement a program or you're starting in a new facility that doesn't already have a pest management professional they're working with. There are so many different advantages. We talked about some of the stuff before, but one thing that I think Is a really important advantage that professionals bring to the table, pest management professionals, is they operate at a lot of different facilities. And while no two facilities are the exact same, best practices and challenges that are happening at your competitor's facility, they can draw from that experience. Use those experiences to help manage and navigate pest problems at your facility before they start. They're also going to have access to all those new tools and technology I just talked about, remote monitoring systems.

If you're going to look to invest in that kind of stuff for your facility, The initial price tag could be pretty high, but if you're working with a pest management professional that already has access to those tools and resources, that may be built into their service costs so the price tag isn't quite as steep for you. You're not buying the equipment and doing those sorts of things for some professionals. Being able to bring them in, like I said, they're going to be able to provide that level of expertise, tap into newest and latest and greatest technology, best practices that are being implemented across all facilities that they work at, rather than just the facility there, and provide that preventative consultation to Make sure that the service model that's being provided for your facility is more of a prescriptive service model. It is uniquely tailored to and designed to your facility to ensure that your facility doesn't run into a major infestation. Are rodents probably always going to be a present around feed and grain facilities?

For sure. I mean, as long as you have that much food available to them, it's like if you take a box You know, sealed box and dunk it underwater. The water pressure that's constantly present around that box, that's rodent pressure around your facility. And all it takes is a tiny failure in one little seam for water to start entering into that box. And before you know it, that box is fully waterlogged and totally damaged. That's the facility. There's always going to be rodent pressure on that facility.

It is going to be impossible to ensure that a facility remains pest-free and rodent-free to an acceptable level without somebody there to provide that service 24-7. Yeah, to anyone out there listening, unfortunately we kind of work in their dream environment.

Kilger - 38:50

Dark, moist, plenty of places to hide, tons of food, everything you could dream of.

Bentley - 39:01 Grain, as far as the eye can see, whole silos of it.

Kilger - 39:05

Mike, thank you so much for joining me. Where can people find out more information, contact you, learn more about this problem?

Bentley - 39:13

Yeah, so they can find more information at www.pestworld.org. Tons of information about rodents there. If you don't already have a pest management professional you're working with, we've got a tool on the website called a zip code locator. You can throw your zip code into the field there on the website and it will help to provide a list of licensed pest management professionals in the area that have the training and expertise to be able to handle problems just like this.

Kilger - 39:42

Fantastic. Well, thank you again for joining me.

Bentley - 39:44

Yeah, absolutely. Thank you so much again for having me on. I really enjoyed it.

Kilger - 39:47

Yeah, we'll have to have you again. Maybe we can talk about, know, spring pets control or something like that. But for everyone out there listening, thank you for doing so. And until next time, stay safe.

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