Most lasting rodent control is boring: remove food, seal holes, and use mechanical traps in places pets and wildlife cannot reach. Poison is the option that keeps working after you walk away — including on animals you never meant to kill. That aftermath is what shelters treat. It is also what Texas law can punish. Use the boring tools.

Start with the house, not the woods

• Store pet food and bird seed in sealed containers
• Fix gaps around pipes, garage doors, and crawl spaces
• Clear brush piles against the house, not the entire greenbelt
• Bring in fallen fruit and open compost

If you must trap

• Use snap traps or enclosed multi-catch traps in garages, attics, and interiors
• Place them where dogs, cats, raccoons, and children cannot reach them
• Check traps daily
• If a licensed product is used at all, follow the label exactly — including any requirement for a tamper-resistant bait station

What not to do

• Do not leave poison blocks or food mixed with poison in a greenbelt, park, or along a fence line on public land
• Do not make homemade baits with household chemicals
• Do not shoot into a shared wooded strip
• Do not relocate community cats to a new neighborhood and call it solved