When you are a homeowner, one of the issues you will dread having to deal with is finding that the home has a bad odor because of the presence of rotting matter within the air ducts in the home. This can be very disconcerting, particularly if the smell emanates from a main duct. In such cases, it means that the smell will dissipate to the entire house, which in turn means that most of the household members are likely to be uncomfortable. To avoid this, you need to come up with a number of strategies to ensure that this does not happen in the first place.

One of the commonest reasons why the air in your home might end smelling like rotten flesh is because animals crawl into the air ducts, die and then start decaying. This can be a particularly difficult problem to deal with, especially since you may have no idea about where the smell is coming from. Some of the things you can try out to avoid finding yourself in this position include:

Don’t attempt to clean the ducts on your own

One of the common mistakes most make is to try and find the dead animal in the duct on their own. There are several risks involved in this. For one, if there are other animals in other parts of the ducts, you may end up being injured. If you own a home that has multiple ducts, you will find it difficult to identify the one that has the dead animal in it. This will not only waste a lot of time, but will also be very frustrating as well.

Avoid putting traps within the ducts

Some homes are infested by pests such as rats, mice and other rodents. If you find that some of them travel within the air ducts, it would be unwise to place a trap within the ducts. The reason is that if the trap actually works, one of the pests might end up being caught, die and then start decaying the duct. Sometimes, the pests will drag the trap for some distance before they become exhausted and die. This means that if you went to the spot where you initially placed the trap, you may not be able to find it. If the pest had dragged the trap to the deeper parts of the ducts, finding it may become nigh impossible.

This basically means that if you ever have a pest infestation problem and realized that the ducts were involved, it would be wisest to involve the services of a pest control expert to help you out. They are usually in a much better position to figure out what to do to avoid adverse outcomes such as the pest dying in an inaccessible part of the duct.

Prevent animals from getting into the ducts in the first place

Preventing small animals from getting into the ducts in the first place is the best way of ensuring that you will never have to deal with the issue of bad odor from the ducts. This can be done in a variety of ways depending on the design of the air ducts. For instance, if you have one that opens to the outside of the house, you could install a wire mesh to act as a sort of gate to prevent entry of any animals from the outside through the vent.

Use professional cleaning services

If you found that a pest or an animal has died within the air ducts, you should consider consulting a reputable firm that provides air duct cleaning in Fayetteville, NC. Not only will they be quick to remove the animal corpse, they will also be in a better position to reach the more inaccessible parts of the ducts.