The weather is starting to turn, it’s getting warmer, sunnier (at times), and generally more pleasant to be outside. Pleasant as that might be for us, it also means that many of the pests that can infest our homes and gardens are going to suddenly become a lot more active, as well. As such, we’re going to look at some of the most common springtime pests, and what you can do to manage their presence on your own property.
Ants
One of the most frustrating issues with ants is that it can seem like your home is doing just fine, totally protected, then all of a sudden you find a trail of them all throughout the kitchen or you find that they’ve been into your food, often nibbling right through boxes to contaminate your pantry. Ants tend to hibernate near the home, and once they get a scent of food with their excellent sense of smell, nothing will stop them from coming into the home, unless you take the time to secure it properly. Composite cladding has become a popular way to protect the home lately, acting as an impassible barrier for ants, but you should do what you can to keep your kitchen clean and avoid leaving any food out in the open. You can move foods that you might normally keep in boxes, like cereal, grains, and sugars, to Tupperware containers, too.
Bed bugs
Just thinking about bed bugs can make you start to feel itchy. As the name implies, bed bugs are likely to live in your bedding, but they can live in other spaces in the home, as well, such as in clothing and linens, in openings in the wall, and more. They are so small that it’s usually impossible to see them, and they can be very hard to remove, as they tend to lay their eggs, which can be resilient to many common household removal methods typically. The best way to remove bed bugs is with the help of a professional who can isolate and dehydrate them so that not even the eggs survive.
Ticks
The bites of some insects, such as bed bugs, can be relatively harmless, doing little except for causing an itch and some irritation for most people. With ticks, however, the risk of a bite can be significantly higher. Ticks bite animals as well as humans, and the different kinds of ticks tend to stick to feeding on one type of creature in particular, but they can all carry diseases, with Lyme disease being the most famous. Check yourself, your kids, and your pets for bites any time you go outside, and know how to get rid of ticks. A lot of breeds tend to live in long grass, so keeping your lawn trimmed is important for the safety of the home, not just for maintaining a nice-looking garden.
Lice
Another biting insect, lice are typically a lot less potentially harmful than ticks, but they can definitely be annoying, causing an itch that feels like it’s never going to go away. Lice are not particularly common, in that they don’t tend to live around homes, like ticks, or inside homes, like bed bugs. But once they find a home in human hair, they will spread from person to person until it becomes a community-wide problem. Lice prevention is all about being aware if there are lice in the area, and teaching your kids habits to prevent them from hopping on to take a ride on their own heads.
Mosquitoes
Although usually a summer pest, in particular, mosquitoes can start to appear in warmer parts of the country quite early into spring, as well. There are few pests that can seem so numerous and so annoying. For the most part, mosquito bites are not going to do too much harm, but they have been known to carry a range of diseases, so it’s best to mitigate the risk as best as possible. Avoiding mosquitoes tends to be the best way to deal with them. You might want to avoid being out around dusk or dawn in areas where they are known to appear and keep your legs and arms covered, using insect repellent on any areas of bare skin to prevent them from biting. Standing water, such as in puddles, buckets, and the like is a common breeding ground for mosquitoes, so try to keep it out of your property.
Wasps
Although not typically as dangerous as mosquitoes, in terms of spreading disease, wasps and hornets can be quite scary, and their stings can be painful. In most cases, wasps are not aggressive, but hornets and yellow jackets very much can be. There is also the risk of an allergic reaction for some people. If you see any wasps or hornets around your home, then it is likely that there is a nest in the area, and you might want to hire a pest control team to remove it as safely as possible, as doing so yourself or even accidentally encountering it could lead to an unpleasant experience.
Termites
A lot of the pests mentioned here can be of some risk to your health and body, or at the very least can be a nuisance. Termites don’t show much interest in humans or other living beings for the most part. However, wood is what brings them into the home and it is also there that they can do a ton of damage. Whether they live in the wood itself or underneath the home, termites can do thousands, if not millions, of dollars worth of damage by eating away at the wood in the attics, supports, and other parts of the home, so any signs of termites should have you calling a local pest team as soon as you can.
While you might be preparing your home to get it ready for the latter half of spring and the warmth and light of summer, keep some room in your thoughts for pests. The earlier you start taking measures to prevent and mitigate their presence, the more likely you are to succeed.