What pest is that? Your Sydney identification guide

The pests Sydney homes deal with most often are rats and mice, cockroaches, termites, ants, spiders, bed bugs, fleas, mosquitoes and wasps, along with the quieter ones that damage what you own, such as silverfish, pantry and clothes moths, and booklice. Rodents and cockroaches tend to move indoors and get worse over the cooler months, termites are a year-round threat to timber, biting pests such as bed bugs and fleas can appear in any season, and damp-loving pests such as silverfish and booklice build up wherever a room stays humid. Our Pest Library has a guide for each, covering what it looks like, the signs, whether it is dangerous and what to do.

Start with three things: its size, where you found it, and the signs it left behind. Size separates a mouse from a rat and a cockroach from a beetle. Location is a strong clue, as roof and ceiling noises point to rodents, kitchen sightings to cockroaches or ants, and bites in bed to bed bugs. Signs like droppings, mud tubes, shed skins, webs or gnaw marks narrow it down further. Match those against the guides in this library, and if you are still unsure, send us a photo.

Night-time scratching, scurrying or gnawing in the roof or wall cavities is usually rats or mice, most often the black rat, also called the roof rat, which is an agile climber that nests in ceilings and roof voids. In Sydney it can also be possums, especially when the sounds are heavier, like thumping, heavy footsteps or a low territorial growl around dusk and dawn, while rats and mice tend to be lighter, faster and scratchier. Possums are a protected native animal, so they are dealt with by removal and proofing rather than extermination. If you are not sure which one you are hearing, send us a photo, or a short video that captures the noise, and we will tell you what you are dealing with.

Take a clear photo if you safely can, note where you found it and any signs like droppings or damage, and send it to PestOz or give us a call. Our licensed Sydney technicians can identify it and advise on the best treatment, and there is no charge to ask. Avoid handling anything you think could be a dangerous spider or a wasp nest, and never disturb a suspected termite tube, since that can make the problem harder to treat.