What Is an Incursion?
When you open your morning playback, you won't see one continuous wall of data from 9 PM to 6 AM. The system organizes overnight activity into incursions — distinct periods of rodent activity separated by gaps of silence.
An incursion starts when a sensor detects motion and continues to include all sensor data until there's a 15-minute break with no triggers anywhere. That 15-minute silence marks the end of one incursion and the beginning of a quiet period. If motion picks up again later, that's a new incursion.
Why 15 Minutes?
Rodents don't move in one smooth trip. They pause, feed, explore, and resume. A 15-minute gap is long enough to indicate a rodent has left the area or returned to its nest — not just stopped to nibble something. This threshold separates genuine separate visits from natural pauses within a single outing.
This matters because incursions give each visit a beginning and an end — a first movement and a last movement. You can track where the rodent came from and where it went back to for each individual incursion. And critically, the number and pattern of incursions tells you something about the scope of the problem.
The Shy Visitor Pattern
If you're dealing with one mouse — or maybe two — the playback data has a recognizable signature.
You'll see a handful of incursions through the night. Maybe three or four. Each one is relatively short — the rodent comes out, moves from sensor to sensor in a trackable sequence, and returns. There are clear gaps between incursions. The overnight heat map shows a path, not a flood.
3–4 incursions, clear gaps between them
Each block is one incursion. Gaps represent 15+ minutes of silence. The rodent makes a trip, returns, waits, repeats.
The key telltale: sensors trigger sequentially. Sensor 3 fires, then Sensor 5 a minute later, then Sensor 2 a couple of minutes after that. You can follow the movement from one point to the next. That's one animal making its rounds.
This is the scenario most homeowners are in — and often the easiest to resolve. A single mouse or a pair making nightly trips through the same route. Identify the first and last movement, trace it back to the entry point, and close it off.
The Infestation Pattern
An infestation looks completely different in the data — and it's obvious almost immediately.
Instead of a few short incursions with gaps between them, you'll see one long, unbroken incursion that runs most of the night. The sensors never go 15 minutes without a trigger because there are always rodents moving somewhere. Activity starts early and doesn't stop.
One continuous incursion, no significant gaps
One massive block. No 15-minute gaps because activity never stops long enough. Multiple rodents keeping the sensors engaged all night.
But the clearest sign isn't just the duration — it's the simultaneous triggers. You'll see sensors that are a good distance apart lighting up at nearly the same time. One mouse can't be in the basement and the kitchen simultaneously. If Sensor 1 (near the stairs) and Sensor 6 (far wall) trigger within seconds of each other, that's multiple animals moving at once.
That pattern is unmistakable. It's the difference between tracking a single set of footprints and looking at a highway.
Side by Side: How to Tell the Difference
🐭 Shy Visitor
1–2 rodents, manageable problem
🐀 Infestation
Multiple rodents, serious problem
Using Playback Speed to Read the Patterns
Depending on how much data was recorded overnight, you can adjust the speed of the playback to match what you're looking for.
With a shy visitor — maybe a few dozen motion events across 3 or 4 incursions — a moderate playback speed lets you follow the movement from sensor to sensor. You can watch the path unfold and get a clear sense of direction.
With an infestation — hundreds or even a thousand events in a single continuous incursion — you'll want to increase the speed. At high playback speeds, the pattern becomes unmistakable: sensors across the space flashing in rapid succession, multiple areas active at once. What looks chaotic at normal speed becomes a readable heat map at higher speeds, showing you which zones carry the most traffic.
Speed as a Diagnostic Tool
Playback speed isn't just about convenience — it's a way to read the data at the right scale. Slow for tracking individual movements. Fast for seeing the big picture. The ability to shift between the two is how you go from "there's activity" to "I understand the activity."
From the Field: 30 Feet Above the Room
The Entry Point Nobody Would Have Found
In an early test environment, the sensors were picking up heavy infestation-level data — one continuous incursion running all night. But something in the playback stood out. The first triggers each night were consistently coming from the same sensor, positioned near a wall where ductwork ran along the ceiling.
The ductwork ran nearly 30 feet above the room.
Once we understood the pattern — and focused on that entry area — you could almost count them as they passed by that first sensor. One after another, coming in along the ductwork, then fanning out into the room below.
Closing up that area corrected the majority of the problem. The overnight data went from one massive continuous incursion to near silence within days.
Without the sensors, we would not have narrowed that down as the source. A visual inspection of the room would have shown droppings on the floor and signs of activity everywhere — but nothing pointing 30 feet straight up. The data told us what the eyes couldn't.
What to Do with What You See
Once you understand which pattern you're looking at, the response is different for each:
If it's a shy visitor:
You're in a good position. Use the first and last movement method to track the entry point. A few nights of moving sensors toward the source should narrow it down. Seal the entry, leave the sensors in place to verify, and you're done.
If it's an infestation:
The data is still working for you — it's just telling you a harder truth. Focus on the simultaneous trigger patterns to estimate how many rodents are active. Use the first triggers each night to identify the primary entry point, but expect secondary entry points too. This is where professional help makes the biggest difference — and the sensor data gives them a head start they wouldn't otherwise have.
Either Way, You Know
The worst position is not knowing the scope of what you're dealing with. A shy visitor and an infestation require very different responses — and without data, you're guessing which one you have. The incursion patterns take the guessing out of it.
One mouse making nightly trips? That's a solvable problem. An infestation with multiple entry points? That's a solvable problem too — it just requires more resources. The data tells you which response matches your situation.
Find Out What You're Dealing With
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