Each year, thousands of Arizona residents email or call Rosie Romero’s radio show with questions about everything from preventing fires in their chimneys to getting rid of tree roots invading their sewer system. His goal is to provide answers that suit the specific lifestyle wherever someone lives in Arizona.
Q: I’ve been having a lot of trouble lately with desert pack rats making nests under my car and chewing on the wires in the engine. I’ve tried some home remedies like putting mothballs in cheesecloth patches around the area, but they just chew up the cheesecloth and leave the mothballs behind. How can I stop this problem?
A: Your basic problem is that the numbers of pack rats may have increased in your neighborhood, and now they’re looking for new territory where they can build their homes. If you’re parking your cars outside and don’t have a garage, you should keep moving the car every day and park in new places. You can also try putting some landscape lighting in the area near the cars. Those lights may keep those rats away because they like to nest in places where they’re not noticed. You can also try putting a light under the hood of the car at night. But if all that fails, you probably have to have an exterminator work on reducing the population of desert rats by trapping them and removing them from your property.
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For more do-it-yourself tips, go to rosieonthehouse.com. An Arizona home building and remodeling industry expert for 25 years, Rosie Romero is the host of the syndicated Saturday morning Rosie on the House radio program, heard locally from 8-11 a.m. on KNST-AM (790) in Tucson and KGVY-AM (1080) and -FM (100.7) in Green Valley. Call 888-767-4348.
