Murray, UT · on our regular Salt Lake County route
Pest Control in Murray, Utah
Rat calls in Murray run about twice our rate elsewhere, fourth of the 36 cities we service at volume, while mosquitoes run at a fifth despite the river. We treat for the city you actually live in.
Text (385) 425-1766 with a question or a photo of the bug, and we will get back to you, free, usually same day.
Murray is the oldest thing in the middle of the valley and the easiest to drive straight through. The first smelter went up in 1869, the city incorporated in 1903, and the ASARCO lead smelter ran until 1949. The stacks came down in 2000 so a hospital campus could go up. The street grid they were built around is still here, and so is everything buried under it.
That shapes Murray pest control more than anything else. We have worked Utah homes for 29 years, and this file reads like what Murray physically is: permanent water down the west side, a hundred-year-old core, mature trees, and no open edge left.
The local picture
What Murray’s service records actually say
First, what these numbers are. They come from our own service records: 2,778 Murray appointments measured against the rest of our Utah work, with every ranking drawn from the 36 cities where we log enough volume to compare fairly. It is a record of what people call us about, not a census of everything living here.
Spiders, ants and wasps are the bulk of the work in every Utah city, Murray included. Where Murray pulls away:
- Rat calls are 4.4% of our Murray work against 2.1% across the rest of our area. Just over twice the rate, fourth of the 36 cities we service at volume.
- Snail calls run close to twice the rest-of-area rate, eighth of those 36, and springtail calls about half again, sixth.
- Elm seed bug calls are 3.9% of the work against 2.8% elsewhere, eleventh of the 36.
- Mosquito calls are 0.2% here against 0.8% everywhere else, 32nd of the 36. That is a strange line for a city built along a river.
Scroll the chart sideways to see the full scale →
The hot rows are one substance: water that never shuts off. The cold rows say that same water produces fewer mosquito calls than almost anywhere else we work, and that is not luck.
Not sure what you are looking at?
Text us a question or a photo of the bug. We will identify it and tell you whether it needs treating or not, free, usually the same day.
The big one
Rats: water, cover and old pipe inside the same hundred feet
Rat calls are fourth of the 36 cities we service at volume. Only Holladay, Millcreek and Cottonwood Heights run higher, and all four are long-settled valley cities with nothing left to subdivide. Be clear on what that is not: it is not a comment on anyone’s housekeeping. Norway rats want permanent water, steady food and continuous cover close together, and Murray supplies all three without a single resident doing anything wrong.
Water, in three corridors at once. The Jordan River runs down Murray’s west side, and both Big Cottonwood Creek and Little Cottonwood Creek reach the Jordan at the city. Little Cottonwood runs 22.6 miles with 21.9 of them listed as impaired in the Seven Greenways Vision Plan. Low, slow, weedy bank is what a Norway rat burrows into, and Murray has three such corridors inside 12.3 square miles.
Cover and food, decades of both. Detached garages, decks raised over crawl space, deep window wells, woodpiles on dirt, ivy thickening in the same bed since the smelter site was still a smelter site, and old fruit trees dropping apricots and walnuts on schedule. None of that is neglect. That is a mature yard, in a commercial hub where few blocks sit far from a waste enclosure.
Pipe. A dense old city is also a dense old network of buried line and catch basins. Service records cannot prove a link to what is under the street. What we can say is that the four highest rat shares in our Utah data all belong to long-settled valley cities with decades-old buried line, and Murray is the one with a river through it.
On your own lot: pick up fallen fruit, lift the woodpile off the ground, cut ivy off the foundation, screen crawl space vents, cap window wells, and seal gaps wider than half an inch. If the house has a history of slow drains, scoping the lateral beats another bait station. Rats range well past one property overnight, so Murray work usually means exterior stations plus exclusion, not one interior visit.
The mosquitoes Murray mostly does not get
Murray sits on the Jordan River, and mosquito calls are 32nd of the 36 cities we service at volume, about a fifth of the rest-of-area rate. In Syracuse they run nearly four times our area rate.
Two things look like they account for most of the gap. The first is physics: mosquitoes breed in still water, and a flowing river is poor habitat. The second is a public agency doing its job. Murray falls inside the South Salt Lake Valley Mosquito Abatement District, which lists the city by name in its boundaries. The district says larval control is the main focus of its work, and notes that urban mosquitoes able to carry West Nile virus thrive in catch basins, which is why a crew inspects every one several times each summer. Sandy and West Jordan, also inside that district, run similarly cold in our records.
So here is the thing a pest control company is not supposed to say: most Murray homeowners do not need mosquito service. If you are bitten in your own yard at dusk, that is harborage on your lot rather than breeding. Otherwise put the money into rodent exclusion.
Snails and springtails: the damp ground crowd
The counts behind these two are small, a few dozen calls, so read them as a tilt in the mix rather than a plague. Both pests want the same thing. USU Extension notes that snails and slugs hide by day under plants, rocks, wood or compost and move at night. Springtails want cool, dark, moist soil and decaying wood, and USU adds that they harm neither people nor pets.
Our best read on why Murray tilts this way is shade plus habit. Yards under an eighty-year-old canopy do not dry out between waterings, and older irrigation schedules tend to be generous. The fix is as much water management as treatment: shorten run times, water in the morning, and clear the boards and pots that give both pests somewhere to spend the day.
Elm seed bugs and box elder bugs: your park strip in the data
Elm seed bug calls are 3.9% of the Murray mix against 2.8% elsewhere, eleventh of the 36 cities we service at volume. Box elder bugs are 10.8%, also eleventh. Neither is a headline number, and together they tell you how old the trees are.
Both are tree-dependent. USU Extension records the first confirmed Utah occurrence of elm seed bugs in July 2014. They feed on elm seed, run one generation a year, and reach adulthood by mid to late June, which is when they start pushing through window gaps and door thresholds. Box elder bugs need female, seed-bearing boxelder trees, which is why they mass on sunny walls in long-planted towns and barely register in new subdivisions.
Murray Power’s own forestry division plants and maintains the street trees in park strips across the city, and the result is a canopy most newer cities will not have for forty years. Treatment for both is a June exterior barrier plus caulk and weather stripping, not anything done to the tree.
The other side of the list
What Murray runs short of
The cold rows save you money, so they deserve attention too.
Flies. 0.4% of the Murray mix against 1.2% elsewhere, 35th of the 36 cities we service at volume.
Wasps. 13.3% here, 27th of the 36 we service at volume, below our area average. That surprises people, because wasps dominate the big-lot Davis County cities. Smaller lots and fewer sheds mean less of the sheltered void space a paper wasp queen shops for in April.
Voles. About two thirds of the rest-of-area rate. Voles come out of pasture, canal bank and unbuilt lots, and Murray has none of that left.
Beetles and aphids both run near half the area rate.
Mice. 8.9%, slightly below our area average, which is worth noticing next to a rat number that is double it.
None of that changes the daily job. Spiders are still a third of what we treat and ants 15.5%, the same as everywhere in Utah.
A Murray pest control calendar
What we are treating, and when. The highlighted row is where we are today.
| When | What matters in Murray |
|---|---|
| March, April | Rebait exterior rodent stations before rat breeding. Check crawl vents and window wells, and treat eaves before wasp queens settle. |
| May, June | Ants push indoors with the first heat. The elm seed bug barrier has to be down before adults appear in mid to late June. |
| July, August | Peak irrigation, so peak snails and springtails. Stinging insect season. |
| September, October | Box elder bugs mass on sunny walls, the short window when treatment does the most. Fruit drops and rats move toward structures. |
| November to February | The heaviest rodent months. Rats work crawl spaces, garages and wall voids, and exclusion does most of the work. |
Why a Murray homeowner should call us
Why Murray homeowners call Beeline
We run Murray on a regular route, so you are not waiting on a truck from the other end of the state. We are in the city most weeks, and we have logged 2,778 Murray appointments, which is why this page can tell you what Murray actually calls about.
Beeline is locally owned, 29 years in Utah, 2,300+ five-star reviews, no hidden charges. Our quarterly service covers everything on this page, and if something comes back between visits, so do we. Office: 275 W 1700 S, Clearfield, UT 84015.
Get a free quote: (801) 544-9200, or text us at (385) 425-1766.
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Before you book
Murray pest control questions we actually get asked
Why are rats such a Murray thing when my sister in Draper never sees one?
Habitat, not housekeeping. Rat calls are 4.4% of our Murray work against 2.1% across the rest of our area, fourth of the 36 cities we service at volume, while Draper runs about a third of our area rate. Murray has the Jordan River, two creek confluences and decades of established cover. Draper has newer construction and no river corridor.
I back onto the Jordan River Parkway. Does that make it worse?
We do not track results street by street, so we will not pretend to a precise answer. What we can say is that a vegetated, year-round waterway is the best rat habitat any city has, so the closer your fence line sits to one, the more pressure to plan for. Either way the answer is exclusion first, then exterior stations kept up year round.
Does Murray have mosquito abatement, and does it cover my yard?
Murray is inside the South Salt Lake Valley Mosquito Abatement District, which lists the city in its own boundaries. It focuses on larval control and inspects every catch basin several times each summer, treating the source rather than your shrubs. Given how low Murray's mosquito call volume is, most homeowners here do not need anything extra.
What are the tiny grey specks jumping around my floor drain and window wells?
Almost certainly springtails. Murray is sixth of the 36 cities we service at volume for them. They are harmless, but they are a moisture signal. Check irrigation run times, grading and downspouts before you think about treatment.
My neighbor's house gets swarmed by elm seed bugs every June and mine does not. Why?
Most likely you do not have their trees. Elm seed bugs breed on elm seed, and one mature elm supplies a whole block. Murray's share runs above our area average but well under Millcreek's, which is third of those 36. A June exterior barrier around windows and doors beats anything sprayed in August.
Murray is an old industrial city. Does any of that still matter for pests?
Not chemically. What matters is the shape the industry left behind: an early street grid, old buried utilities, small lots and a canopy planted generations ago. That combination puts Murray fourth of our 36 for rats and well below average for wasps and flies, the pests of newer, more spread out cities.
Three ways to get a Murray quote
All of them free, all of them with a real person at our Clearfield office.
- 1Send us a photo(385) 425-1766. Fastest answer.
- 2Call us(801) 544-9200. Mon to Fri 7:30am to 7:00pm, Sat 7:30am to 4:00pm.
- 3Fill in the formSend a picture of the bug or the damage and we will tell you what it is and what it costs.