Bed Bugs… The Year-Round Pest

Bed Bugs... The Year-Round Pest

Many people mistakenly believe that bed bugs are only a concern during certain times of the year, but bed bugs are actually a problem throughout the year. With Tennessee winters offering mostly mild temperatures, bed bugs are not exposed to extreme cold; and since they only need human blood to survive, you can experience bed bug infestations at any time of the year.

Blood Sucking Bed Bugs

Bed bugs survive on human blood. They don’t need a lot of it to survive, either. Adult bed bugs can live as long as a year without a meal! Even immature bed bugs can go for several months in between feedings. Female bed bugs lay one or two eggs every single day, meaning she keeps the species going at the rate of hundreds of bed bug eggs in her lifetime. If you have bed bugs, you can count on them living for a long time; and to get rid of them, you’ll need to enlist the help of pest control professionals.

How Do Bed Bug Infestations Happen?

Bed bugs are tiny. They’re about the size of an apple seed, which means they can hide in the tiniest of crevices, seams, and lining of your bedding materials. It also makes it easy for these pests to get into your home. They may hitch a ride inside on your clothing, if you’ve been exposed to bed bugs on public transportation, in hotels, or at a friend’s house. Bed bugs may get into your luggage. They can come inside from books you’ve borrowed from the library or on secondhand furniture or clothing. Once inside, bed bugs quickly breed and take over your home if they are not properly eliminated. Do it yourself methods will not work to remove a bed bug infestation.

Bed Bug Myths

If you think bed bugs die off in the colder fall and winter months, think again – especially in Knoxville, Tennessee where the winter weather tends to be very mild. Not to mention, people travel to Knoxville all year round from all over the country and can very easily introduce bed bugs to public areas, where they can then find their way into your home.

Bed bugs do not discriminate and are found in clean homes as well as dirty ones. Many people believe bed bugs will only infest a dirty home or hotel but that’s simply not the case. They do not care about the conditions of their environment. As long as there is human blood there, they are happy.

Also, bed bugs do not necessarily stay in your bedding. You can find them in your couch, chairs, and closets. They wander around like they own the place – which makes it even harder to get rid of them. If you have bed bugs in your Knoxville area home, your best option is to call Russell’s Pest Control for professional bed bug elimination.

5 Things Every Homeowner Should Know About Stink Bugs

5 Things Every Homeowner Should Know About Stink Bugs

Do you know what a stink bug is? If you live in our Tennessee service area, we’re sure you do. When temperatures drop, these crop pests start to become household pests. Here are the 5 things you need to know about stink bugs if you own a home.

  1. Stink bugs stink. This is not a pest you want to crush. Ever. They emit a foul odor when squashed. The better course of action is to suck them up with a vacuum and dispose of the bag. This is a great solution for inside your home and a reasonably helpful solution if you only have a few stink bugs come to crawl on your exterior walls, window sills, and screens.

  2. It is better to keep stink bugs out. If you have more than a dozen stink bugs visit your home this fall, it will be easier on your wallet to keep them out, rather than have them treated once they get in. Stink bugs get into wall voids and other hard-to-reach places. This makes them a difficult pest to treat inside.

  3. Screens. Screens. Screens. We can’t say this enough times. As a homeowner, your first line of defense against stink bugs is working screens. Stink bugs are notorious for exploiting entry points in–and around–window and door screens.

  4. It is important to seal gaps. When stink bugs crawl on the sun-warmed side of your home, it is only natural for them to look for a way to get under the “bark” of your home–after all, your house is nothing more than a tree or a log to those stink bugs. It is vital to do a detailed inspection of your exterior walls and look for any gaps, holes, cracks, or openings these bugs can use to gain entry. Cover vents with window-grade screening. Use mortar to seal foundation walls. Use a caulking gun to seal up gaps and holes you don’t have the time or money to fix right now. Exclusion is key in the fight against stink bugs.

  5. There are some things only a pest control company can do. Every home has its vulnerabilities. And sometimes it takes a trained professional to find them. A professional can also apply EPA approved products to make sure your defensive wall is impenetrable.

If you need help keeping stink bugs and other overwintering pests from getting into your home this fall, and you live in our service area, the pest specialists here at Russell’s Pest Control have the experience and the education to get the job done right.

The best defense against stink bugs is a good offense. Let Russell’s Pest Control help you pick out the best pest control options for your home.

Rodent Awareness Week

Rodent Awareness Week

October 23rd-29th is rodent awareness week, this annual event comes at the perfect time to educate home and business owners about these invasive and dangerous pests. Rodents like mice and rats are a year-round problem, but during the fall and winter months, they are more motivated to enter your home or business to seek refuge from the colder weather as well as easy access to food and water. Russell’s Pest Control wants to make sure that you aware of the negative impacts that rodents can have on your home or business and why it is so important to protect both from these furry terrors.

Rodents will take every advantage given to them while trying to enter your home, a tiny crack in the foundation, a gap underneath an exterior door, a space found around a pipe entering into your home, or a hole in the roof line. Once rodents get into your home they tend to make themselves right at home, but we are warning you- rodents make terrible houseguests. Listed below are some of the reasons why rodents need to be eliminated from your home as quickly as possible!

  • They need to eat, which means that they are going to be eating the food you have stored in your kitchen and pantry areas, contaminating it with their saliva, urine, and feces.

  • They spread a host of dangerous diseases like Salmonella and the very serious Hantavirus.

  • Rodents are constantly chewing on items and can cause major structural damage within your home. They will chew through wires, pipes, drywall, insulation, flooring, and more. The damages that they cause can lead to fires, water leaks, and mold issues.

  • Rodents destroy personal items like books, clothing, pictures, and furniture.

Rodents don’t just invade family homes; they also enjoy invading commercial properties. Inside of a commercial facility they cause many of the same damages that they do in homes: structural damages, damage to personal items, damage to inventory, contaminate food; and they spread diseases that could potentially affect you, your employees, and customers. In a business however, rodents can cause a type of damage that may be even worse, damage to your business’s reputation. Just one customer spotting one rodent dropping or spying a mice running along the wall will cause them to not want to return and to tell their friends and family about the incident, causing people in the community to have a negative opinion about your business.

So now you know why rodents are such dangerous pests, what do you do to stop them? The best solution to any rodent or pest infestation is to put into place a year-round pest control program. At Russell’s Pest Control we offer both residential and commercial year-round pest control services to protect your property from the dangers that rodents bring inside with them. Our highly trained rodent control experts can safely and quickly solve current problems with rodents in your home or business and provide routine services to prevent future problems with them.

Don’t let rodents invade your home or business this fall, winter, or any other time of the year, keep them outside where they belong with the help of the rodent control experts at Russell’s Pest Control. Give us a call today to start protecting your property from rodents!

Keeping Fall Invaders Out

Keeping Fall Invaders Out

Temperatures are beginning to dip. You’ve probably noticed. You may have also noticed that a few trees have a red leaf or two. That’s right. It’s coming. It comes every year. There is no stopping it. Winter is inevitable. You know it. We know it. And bugs know it. But allowing them to get into your home is not inevitable.

When stink bugs, lady bugs, and boxelder bugs, start crawling in your curtains, piling up on your window sills, crawling on your television, and landing in your morning cereal, it is too late to apply any kind of DIY pest control measures to deal with the problem. Once these pests get in, only an educated pest professional can fix the issue. But, there are some things you can do to keep them out. Here are some ideas.

Fall Pest Protection

  • When these bugs come to crawl on your window screens, make sure they don’t find any tears, holes, or gaps. Do a close inspection and replace or repair any damaged screen you find. There are some helpful videos online to help you make simple patches.
  • It is important to check around windows, as well. These bugs are small and it is easy for them to squeeze through tiny gaps between your screen and the window frame. If you find any holes, cover them.
  • If you have sliding screen doors, it is important to check the weather stripping to make sure there are no damaged bristles that will allow these bugs to squeeze in. It is also important to keep the screen door closed, even if the interior glass door is closed. If these bugs are on the glass or frame of your sliding glass door when you open it, you could bring them right into your home.
  • All of these bugs will exploit any gap or opening you have in your exterior walls. Make sure all of your vents are covered with screening, all gaps around pipes and utilities are sealed, and use a caulking gun or wire mesh to fill in holes that have been created by other pests.
  • Keep your garage door closed when you’re not exiting or entering, and ensure that the door sweep on the door that goes from your garage to the interior of your home makes a proper seal.
  • Consider having a pest control company do an exterior treatment to keep these pests away, and to bolster vulnerable areas.

It is hard to completely exclude overwintering pests without a little help. If you need assistance keeping these and other pests out of your home, and you live in our Tennessee service area, let Russel’s Pest Control give you a hand. You can probably live with overwintering pests, but isn’t nicer to not have them crawling on your oatmeal, staining your furniture, and blocking your view of the game? Do not let them overwintering pests invade your home with helpful pest control service from Russell’s Pest Control.