What you need to know about pests in Southern California
California is home to many people and, unfortunately, many different animals and insects. Many of these insects and small mammals like rodents have discovered the benefits of living with people and have made a name for themselves as household pests. We have put together an informational pest guide to help you guard your home against our area’s most common pests. Keep reading to learn more about the insects and rodents that want to call your Irvine area house their home.
Ants
California is home to many insects that thrive in our wide-open spaces and urban centers. These pests will take advantage of anywhere they find food, water, and appropriate nesting sites. Ants are social insects that live in colonies with thousands of individuals working together to ensure their success. To maintain their colonies, ants divide their members into different groups; workers (infertile females), males, and queens (fertile females). Worker ants make up the bulk of the colony and carry most of the workload. Workers are the insects you see trailing through your property as they forage for food.
There are a wide variety of ants in our area, with some of the most common being Argentine ants, odorous house ants, pharaoh ants, and red imported fire ants. Some are more dangerous than others, but all are unwanted on our properties. The reason ants are so common is because of the food, water, and shelter our properties provide. Though our California yards offer ants everything they need, they often wind up in our homes. Things like bad weather, lack of food, and lack of moisture drive them into our houses. Ants are small, allowing them to get into our homes through openings we probably don’t even realize are present. Working with a pest professional and regular pest control services is the best way to keep these common household pests from becoming a regular fixture in your home!
In conjunction with our professional services, there are some steps you can take to make your property less inhabitable to them:
Take away as many food sources as possible. Keep lids on trash cans, pick up uneaten pet food, and maintain a clean kitchen.
Eliminate water sources; ants are attracted to excess moisture, so things like leaky pipes, fixtures, and dripping air conditioners provide them with vital water sources.
Eliminate as many entry points as possible by inspecting your foundation and sealing any cracks you discover. Seal spaces around wires and pipes leading into your home, install weatherstripping and door sweeps, and make sure screens are secure!
Bed Bugs
We have all heard horror stories about bed bugs and know that we don’t want them in our homes. The best way to keep these blood-feeding pests out of your house is to understand how they get inside in the first place. Bed bugs are reddish-brown in color, oval, and about the size of a large lentil. Their size and shape allow them to remain hidden, and their prolific breeding habits will enable them to create a large infestation that can quickly take over any home.
Bed bugs are closely associated with people because our blood is their preferred food source. These insects live wherever there are people. The most common places to come into contact with them are public spaces like laundry mats, airports, hotels, and schools. Since bed bugs are wingless and primarily live indoors, hitchhiking has become their primary mode of transportation. The most common way they find their way into a new home is by crawling onto a person or into our belongings; when we return home, we bring the bed bugs inside with us. They also regularly move indoors on secondhand items like furniture, mattresses, rugs, and electronics. In multi-unit buildings, bed bugs move from unit to unit by crawling through vents, walls, and ceilings.
Bed bugs want to live with people, so preventing problems with these pests is tricky. The best way to eliminate a current problem is to contact us here at Savior Pest Solutions. We can provide the services necessary to target and eradicate a bed bug infestation. To help you prevent problems with bed bugs, we want to offer the following tips:
Be vigilant in laundry mats, keep your clothing away from other people’s clothing, and after removing it from the drier, immediately take it home to fold.
Always take care when purchasing secondhand items, thoroughly inspecting them for bed bugs and cleaning them before bringing them into your home.
Regularly vacuum your floors and upholstered furniture, and wash and change your family’s bedding to remove stray bed bugs before they can cause a problem.
After purchasing clothing, whether new or used, always wash and dry it on a high heat setting.
In public spaces, keep your belongings up off the ground as much as possible.
For more information about our bed bug control offerings, reach out today and speak with one of our helpful professionals!
German Cockroaches
If you have discovered that cockroaches have moved into your California home, the most likely culprit is the German cockroach. These roaches have adapted to living indoors and are a major problem for home and business owners alike. Their small size, adaptability, and determination make them formidable opponents. The German cockroach is a small roach that is tan in color with two dark parallel lines behind the head. Their small size acts as an advantage and allows them to move with ease through the smallest spaces and hide in very tight spaces.
German cockroaches are usually brought into our homes in cardboard boxes, secondhand furniture and appliances, electronics, and grocery bags. Once inside your home, they will quickly find a place to hide during the day and emerge at night to wreak havoc and forage for food. German cockroaches hang out around drains, toilets, and garbage putting them in constant contact with dangerous bacteria, viruses, and other dangerous pathogens. Inside our homes, they constantly contaminate surfaces and food, putting you and your family’s health at risk. A German cockroach infestation can occur in any home, and their presence should be met with an immediate call to action!
To remove German cockroaches from your home, the professionals at Savior Pest Solutions will provide you with services developed to specifically treat a German cockroach infestation. To help protect your home against these pests, it is crucial always to maintain proper food storage, regularly wipe down surfaces, vacuum, and keep lids on trash cans. The fewer food sources available, the less likely these pests will be able to thrive in your home. It is also important to always inspect items coming into your home for these pests and to repair leaky pipes and fixtures that provide them with the water they need to survive. Call today if you would like more information about our cockroaches control services.
Rodents
Rodents are small mammals that regularly make their way onto our properties. The biggest reason rodents are so problematic around our homes is they have discovered that living near people offers them an easy opportunity to access their basic needs. From the tasty morsels, they scavenge from our trash cans to the sips of water they take from a leaky hose to the safe shelter our home’s wall voids offer, many rodents can’t resist living with people!
California and our warm weather and outdoor space allow many different species of rodents to thrive. We have quite a few varieties of rats in our area, including roof rats and Norway rats, mice like the common house mouse and field mouse, and lawn pests like gophers. What all these animals have in common, in addition to being rodents, is that when they are on our properties, they are problematic. Rodents use their sharp front incisors to cause damage to the structure of our homes, our personal belongings, and our yards, trees, and landscaping. They introduce parasites to our properties in addition to spreading various bacteria and pathogens. And, when nesting in our homes, they will fill their bellies with your family’s food supply and contaminate it in the process!
The best way to tackle a rodent infestation is with the help of the professionals at Savior Pest Solutions. We know how to find and correctly identify the rodents on your property, and through our specialized rodent control services, eliminate them. In addition to our target services, doing things like keeping lids on trash cans, regularly harvesting gardens, picking up pet food, and maintaining a clean kitchen can go a long way in preventing problems with rodents. It is also essential to seal your home’s exterior to make it as difficult as possible to get into your home by installing door sweeps, sealing cracks in the foundations, and repairing roof damage. For more information about our rodent control services please, call today!
Spiders
Like the many other pests that call California home, spiders live in large populations throughout our state. There are many spiders that can end up inside your house, from the harmless house spider and brown widow spider to the dangerous black widow spider and brown recluse spider. What makes dangerous spiders dangerous is not that they are any more aggressive than their non-dangerous counterparts but that the venom they possess is strong enough to cause physical harm to a person. When it comes to spiders, it is important to understand that they aren’t aggressive towards people; they aren’t running around trying to find people to attack. In fact, it is quite the opposite; spiders do their best to stay away from us. Spider bites typically only occur because the spider is trying to protect itself, usually from a hand, foot, or another body part that is about to squish it.
Spiders live in our yards and gardens and spend most of their days eating the insects that are thriving in your lawn and garden areas. California’s warm weather means that spiders and the insects they are feeding on are active throughout much of the year. People usually only have a problem with spiders when they start to move into our homes, garages, and sheds, searching for safe shelter or food. Once inside, spiders don’t make their presence well known; they do their best to stay hidden in dark areas near food sources. Our California kitchens, basements, closets, and attics often become home to spiders. If you notice spiders in your home, know that there are also insects that you don’t see. Year-round pest control is the best way to keep both spiders and the insects they feed on out of your home and from taking over your outdoor spaces.
To remove spiders from your home, reach out to us at Savior Pest Solutions; we will provide you with the services to eliminate the current problem you are experiencing with these eight-legged pests and implement the treatments necessary to save your home from a future infestation. In addition to partnering with us, doing the following things around your property can make it less attractive to these predators:
Cut landscaping back away from your house.
Keep a lid on trash cans to keep the insects that spiders like to feed on from swarming around them.
Keep outside lights off as much as possible. Outdoor lights attract insects and then spiders to the exterior of your home.
Seal entry points, caulk cracks in the foundation, repair damage to the exterior of your home, and repair roof damage to reduce entry points that spiders can use to infiltrate your home.
Place appropriate mesh covers over vents, chimneys, and other large openings leading into your home.
Stinging Insects
Stinging insects like bees, mud daubers, yellow jackets, and wasps often end up building their nest in our California yards, putting homeowners in quite a predicament. On the one hand, we know how important these insects are to the ecosystem. On the other hand, they pose significant dangers to people, especially when nesting or foraging for food in a high-traffic area of our yards. In California, stinging insects can be challenging to deal with as our warm-weather means they are active longer than in cooler parts of the country.
Keeping stinging insects away from your yard is difficult; they are outdoor pests that use their wings to travel to anyplace their basic needs can be met. Unfortunately, having large numbers of stinging insects swarming our yards puts us and our pets in danger, and their nests must be removed. Not all stinging insects are overly aggressive, but all can sting us. Their stings are painful, and the venom they inject can cause reactions like pain, redness, and swelling around the bite site. A serious response will include difficulty breathing and requires immediate medical attention. Having stinging insects flying around your yard as you and your family are trying to enjoy it can make your time spent outside unenjoyable and, depending on the situation, dangerous.
To remove stinging insects from your property, reach out to the professionals at Savior Pest Solutions. We will come to your property, identify the stinging insects present, and safely remove the nest. Preventing problems with stinging insects is tricky because they are outdoor pests and don’t understand property lines! The following tips can help you make your property less attractive to these pests:
Don’t overplant flowering vegetation.
Avoid planting flowers near your doors, windows, and walkways.
Remove areas of standing water that provide them with a water source.
Keep your lawn cut short, fill in bare areas, and keep trees and landscaping pruned.
Place lids on trash cans and recycling bins to prevent yellow jackets and other stinging insects from feeding on the sweets and proteins inside them.
Don’t let the pests that call California home become a familiar presence in and around your Irvine area home. If you are looking for the best pest control in Irvine, turn to the professionals at Savior Pest Solutions. We have the experience, treatments, products, and services necessary to help guard your home and family against California’s toughest pests. To learn more about our residential or commercial pest solutions, reach out to us today!
