One of the frequent questions....

I'm often asked:

"How did you end up doing pest control?"

Well here goes.

At the age of six, we had a minor rat problem in the garden. The Local Authority was called in, and when the 'ratman' arrived, I watched him carefully, fascinated by what he was doing.

When he left, I told my mum: "I want to be a ratcatcher".

Honestly. The age of six!

Anyway, I learnt to trap and snare as a child, and loved every minute of it. Each morning, before setting off for the one and a half mile walk to the school bus, I'd be off with the dog to check my trapline. I became quite proficient at catching squirrels and moles, but I really enjoyed ferretting rats for my terrier.

When the time came to leave school, I was aware that proper pest control wasn't available to me. I plumped for what I thought was the next best thing; gamekeeping.

At seventeen, I left my keepering job (under a bit of a cloud) and decided to become self employed. Pest control was what I really wanted to do, but I really needed money as well, so I went labouring for a builder while I built up the pest control work.

I struck lucky fairly quickly. Because of my shooting connections, I was asked to clear up some rats on the (big) local shoot. I did a good job, and as a result, I was offered the chance to take on the whole estate. I did all the farms for rats, poisoned the moles on a thousand acres of cutting grass and controlled rabbits and squirrels in the forestry.

As the years progressed, the business grew and we also took on 90 acres of farmland on a share farming deal. The two businesses were too much, even for a workaholic, and we left the farm. At the same time, my part time technician came into some money, so we also parted company with the pest control business.

I was then working for MAFF on the wildlife unit. At the end of Foot and Mouth in 2001, I parted company with the government and started looking for something else. Pest control seemed to flow through my veins, so I took a job as a 'Wildlife Technician' with a national pest control company.

A rapid rise through the ranks ended up with my resigning as Regional Manager, in favour of a 'promotion' to General Manager for another much smaller pest control company.

We parted company in February of this year, and the rest, as they say, is history.....

Westcountry Environmental Services was born!