A thermal camera on a small drone, flown after dark, sees rats moving and burrow entrances venting warm air. The result is a GPS map of every active hole on a site — the thing every treatment plan starts from and most vendors never have.
Rats are nocturnal and the ground is coolest at night, so warm bodies and warm burrow air stand out on a thermal sensor. A Part 107 pilot flies a pre-planned grid over the site at 100–200 ft — over the property only, never over people or neighbouring homes. Night flight under Part 107 is legal with anti-collision lighting and the pilot's night training; no waiver is needed.
Our vision model (the same stack we run for FieldScan) tags each warm entrance, counts movement events per area, and writes a GPS point with an activity score. Output is a map layer, not a video someone has to scrub through.
Thermal has false positives: warm pavement, irrigation valves, ground squirrels, and — critically in California — burrowing owls, a protected species that lives in exactly the kind of ground squirrel burrows rats also use. A tech walks every marked point, checks for fresh rat sign (droppings, rub marks, fresh soil), photographs it, and measures distance to the nearest occupied structure. Only verified rat burrows go to treatment.
Part 107 certificated pilot, drone registered, ≤400 ft, visual line of sight, LAANC authorization wherever the site sits under controlled airspace, anti-collision light for night ops. No flights over people, no weapons or hazardous payloads — ever.
The camera is pointed at the site under contract, not at homes. We don't image residences, and we don't keep footage beyond the burrow map. California privacy law on aerial imaging of private property is a line we don't approach.
Burrowing owls, kit foxes and other protected burrowers get a ground check before anything else. A marked burrow that turns out to be an owl's gets a 300-ft no-treatment buffer and a note to the site, not a treatment.
Dense canopy, tall grass and warm concrete reduce detection. Wind above ~20 mph grounds the flight. Very large sites take multiple nights. A sweep tells you where to look — it does not replace the walk.
| Service | Scope | Est. |
|---|---|---|
| One-time site sweep + verified burrow map | Up to ~5 acres, one night, ground verification included | $600–1,200 |
| Monthly re-sweep + updated map | Same site, before/after report | $300–600 / mo |
| City corridor sweep | Parks, creek edges, transit lots — priced per acre | quote |
Estimates for scoping conversations only. Firm pricing follows a site visit.