NEWS
Safe hands – Kill Line owner Sean Mooney uses clever technology to find a safe place for pests .
WORDS : SARAH WALKER PICTURE : CHRIS BOOTH
WE ’ RE BEST FOR
PESTS
Creating a buzz around animal welfare and environmental consciousness
Environmentally-friendly practices and minimising cruelty to animals may not be the first things that spring to mind when you think of pest control .
But Sean Mooney , owner of Teessidebased Kill Line , takes a fresh approach to making homes and businesses safer , more comfortable places to be .
As a responsible pest controller , Kill Line not only significantly reduces the use of rodenticide poison and other chemicals , but is also kinder to animals and the wider ecosystem around them .
No job is too big or too small for Kill Line , which solves all pest problems – from rats to fleas and honey bees .
In the case of bees , Stockton-based Kill Line excels , taking on jobs that many other pest control firms won ’ t touch .
The firm ’ s use of clever technology and specialist work alongside builders , roofers and scaffolding contractors even ensures the creatures are not harmed , but instead are found a new outdoor home to thrive in .
Sean says : “ We use a specialist vacuum cleaner with a soft filter and collecting box so that we can gently hoover up all the bees that may have become trapped in wall cavities or chimney spaces and take them to a new habitat .
“ We remove the whole colony safely and go and put it somewhere else where the bees can live happily .
“ We successfully removed 50 to 60 colonies last year .”
One colony was even recovered from deep in the chimney of a Middlesbrough house .
As can be seen in a fascinating video on the firm ’ s website , scaffolders created access to loft space where a brick wall could be cut into , through which to retrieve the bees and their honeycomb .
Sean says : “ The owner of the house said they ’ d had this bee problem for four years and every year they would get someone out to look at it , but the contractors they got in couldn ’ t deal with it .
“ We sorted it within about a month and those bees are still alive now .
“ If you have bumblebees or honey bees in the wall of your office block or your compost bin , we will get them out , come hell or high water .”
Sean and the company are members of the British Pest Control Association and stringently follow a code of best practice covering the use of rodenticides that protects wildlife that may feed on poisoned animals .
Creatures such as slugs often feed on poisons intended for rats and mice and these smaller creatures are then eaten by the likes of hedgehogs , which are subsequently poisoned .
Larger animals that feed on rats and mice can also be poisoned by rodenticide and Sean explains how this is a particular problem in Britain ’ s owl population .
Sean explains : “ We have successfully reduced the amount of poison we use on a farm from 25kg to 2.5kg .
“ We are therefore minimising the spread of poison going through the animal food chain .
“ We are also looking at plastic reduction in the animal traps we use with a large national supplier .”
The firm even recently rescued several feral cats that were causing problems for a client on an engineering site and rehomed them on farms , where they could run free and keep vermin down in the way nature intended .
Sean , who trained as a blacksmith before going into professional pest control , says he now hopes to get a bit of a buzz going around the fact he runs a responsible business in a profession that is often misunderstood .
“ We are committed to doing our job in the safest , most humane manner possible ,” he adds .
killline . co . uk
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