Pest Control in Great Kills, Staten Island
Great Kills is a thriving South Shore neighborhood known for its protected harbor, which shelters marinas and yacht clubs and gives the area a nautical character. Amboy Road and Giffords Lane form the commercial spine, with family-run restaurants, delis and shops, and the Great Kills station on the Staten Island Railway serves commuters. Great Kills Park, part of Gateway National Recreation Area, stretches along the shore with beaches, trails and fishing spots. Streets are filled with detached single-family homes, from older cottages near the water to postwar capes and newer semi-attached houses, making it popular with families and boaters alike.
Also known as: Gifford's.
About Great Kills
The name comes from the Dutch word kill, meaning creek or channel, and the area was long a fishing and farming community known as Gifford's after a local family. The Staten Island Railway spurred development in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, and the harbor became a center for boating. Great Kills Park was created partly on fill in the mid twentieth century, and the neighborhood expanded rapidly after the Verrazzano-Narrows Bridge opened in 1964.
Common Pest Problems in Great Kills
Great Kills Harbor's marinas, boatyards and waterfront restaurants support Norway rats, which nest among stored boats, docks and shoreline riprap and forage into the surrounding streets. Great Kills Park adds more wildlife to the mix, with raccoons regularly roaming from the park's wooded areas into residential yards. Gray squirrels are common in the neighborhood's mature trees and often find their way into attics through gaps in older rooflines and vents, especially in late winter.
Many homes near the harbor and park sit on damp ground, and basements here often host house centipedes, which feed on other insects in cool, moist spaces. The neighborhood's wood-framed houses, some nearly a century old, are vulnerable to subterranean termites, particularly where old porches and garages sit close to the soil. Mice slip indoors every fall, and homes near the marinas may see them moving in from stored boats and gear.