No one wants to share their home with unwanted insects. Finding ants in your kitchen, bedbugs in your sheets, or roaches in the bathroom will quickly turn your safe space into a scary one.
Here are some tips to help you protect your home and keep the bugs away.
No one wants to live with bugs roaming your house, contaminating your food, and scaring your family. There is a lot you can do to keep unwanted insects out of your home.
Below are some easy and basic tips to enhance your home pest control.
Keep Your House Sealed
Bugs have to get in somehow. While they might fly in occasionally when you're coming and going through your door, most likely, they are getting in through other openings. Check the door and window seals throughout your house to make sure there aren't gaps or openings. Seal up around piping and crawl space access points.
It probably goes without needing to be stated, but don't leave doors or windows open without screens. Make sure those screens don't have rips or holes, or bugs will just find their way in anyway.
Also, make sure you don't have leaky pipes or pooling water anywhere near your foundation or crawl spaces. Standing water is a huge attractant to insects.
Keep it Clean
Keeping a clean house is key to deterring unwanted pests. Clean up food spills immediately and thoroughly. Make sure that trash is covered and taken out regularly. Don't leave unwashed dishes in the sink overnight - this is a tempting buffet for most kinds of insects. Keep floors clear of crumbs, sweep and vacuum regularly. Wipe counters. Basic housekeeping will actually go farther than almost anything else toward maintaining a pest-free home.
Keeping your home clutter-free will also make your home inhospitable for pests. Most insects like places to hide, and clutter provides safety, housing, and warmth for insects to establish colonies.
"Clutter provides places for pests to breed and hide and makes it hard to get rid of them. Get rid of things like stacks of newspapers, magazines, or cardboard." – United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA)
Keep Your Yard Bug Free
If there are very few bugs in your yard, it's unlikely they will make it into your home. Keeping your yard clear of standing water, removing piles of organic matter (such as leaf or wood piles) and tidying up your vegetation will also go a long way in keeping the bugs back from the house.
Most importantly, check the outside spaces around your foundation. Ideally, you need vegetation-free space (like a small-rock border) around your foundation. Having overgrown or close-growing plants touching your foundation or the external walls of your house will substantially increase the chances of getting a bug infestation inside your home, as you'll be providing a great place for them to congregate just outside.
DIY
If you google DIY tips for keeping your home bug-free, you'll see dozens of suggestions about smells that are insect-repellants. They range from lavender, peppermint, and citronella to eucalyptus, vinegar, and practically everything in between. We've heard just about every scent you can imagine being touted as a insect-deterrent.
There are also many websites with directions for making homemade traps, which types of candles to burn inside or outside your home, or even how to use dryer sheets to keep bugs away.
Most of these options are cheap, easy and not harmful (although your house may smell pretty strong depending on which options you pursue). Just remember, the reason there are so many different options are because none of them are universally effective. You may need to try a few different options to determine which will work best in your situation.
Professional Preventative Pest Control
One of the absolute best ways to ensure a safe, bug-free house is by maintaining a professionally applied pest control barrier around the outside of your home. The application of long-lasting pest-deterring chemicals around foundations, doors, and window sills will make a huge difference in keeping pests out, no matter how much they want to get in.
You, as the homeowner, and your pest control company are a team. If you're both doing your part well, you'll win the battle against the bugs.
Call us today so you can "sleep tight, don't let the bed bugs (or anything else!) bite"
To learn more about pests we have in Virginia, visit our pest library
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