rescompestcontrol summer-time pests are coming

summer-time and hordes of pests gohand in hand. One reason is that

warm weather causes pests to multiplymuch faster. For instance, thecommon house fly can take upto 6 weeks to grow from eggto adult fly in cool weather,but in warm weather thistakes only 6 days! Many ofthese pests find their wayinto homes.

While these pests aren’t big andimpressive like bears and alligators, theynevertheless cause serious damage andhealth problems. They also can be anuisance and an embarrassment. Among

the summer pests we encounter arecockroaches (a health hazard

because of the many diseaseorganisms they carry, and theallergies they cause) and

silverfish, which eat intobooks, magazines, anddocuments. Ants are the

most common summer pest,and they cause all sorts of problems.

Stored food pests like flour beetles,moths, and mites spoil stored humanand pet food, and rats and mice arehealth hazards that spoil food and leavebehind their droppings, urine, and hairs.

Other pests can inflict painful or

irritating stings or bites or transmitdiseases, including fleas, ticks, spiders,mites, bees, wasps, bedbugs,mosquitoes and others. Some pests, likecarpet beetles and clothes moths,damage clothing, rugs, and other fabrics.Carpenter ants, termites, and otherpests destroy wood in our homes.

Don’t let any of these pests get theupper hand in your home! We are thearea pest management experts. If youknow anyone whose home is unprotectedfrom constantly-invading pests, let themknow we can help them!

few creatures are feared as much asspiders. There are over 3,000 species

of spiders in this country. Fortunatelymost of them can’t penetrate our skin withtheir fangs. When they do bite peoplethey either don’t inject any venom, or not enough to affect us. Keep in mind,spiders do not actively seek out people to bite.

Nevertheless, there are two types ofspider venom that can cause a seriousreaction. The black widow and its cousinshave a neurotoxic venom. This kind of venom can cause pain as well asmuscle cramping, sweating, weakness,and breathing difficulties. Fatalities from

their bites occur butare rare.

Brown reclusespiders have acytotoxic venomthat can result in anecrotic (ulcerating)wound that is slow to

heal. Bites from these spiders are lesscommon than it might seem. Researchshows that many people who think theyhave been bitten by this kind of spiderhave not been. There are other thingsthat can cause a necrotic wound. Theyinclude bites from other pests, as well asconditions completely unrelated to pests,such as certain kinds of bacterial andfungal infections, and ulcers from diabetesor bed sores.

Recent evidence shows that thecommon sac spiders, which many peoplebelieved caused necrotic wounds, don’tcause those wounds at all. Their bitescause a sharp pain like a bee sting, so it isa neurotoxin.

We are the area experts at spidercontrol. Keep in mind that reinfestationsoccur when young spiders catch a breezeand use it to “parachute” to your home ona silk strand. Also, some spiders are “hunting spiders” that frequentlywander indoors.

Spiders and Their Venomsremove bird nests from eaves and

branches touching your homeimmediately after the young birds stopusing the nests. Various blood-suckingand scavenging bugs live in these nests,and leave the nests when the birds leave.These pests sometimes crawl into homesfrom the abandoned nests.

Pest PreventionTip of the Month

Summer-Time Pests Are Coming

“Honey, maybe this pest problem is bigger

than we thought!”

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New Bee Drills into Sandstone

An amazing, newly discovered bee species boresinto solid sandstone and lays its eggs in it. These

bees do not live in colonies. They are solitary,although they may eventually build many tunnels near

each other. The bee has been found in Utah, southwestColorado, and the Death Valley area of California.

The bees use their very hard mandibles to chew through thestone. Many of the older female bees of this species have mandibles

that show significant wear and tear. The young bees that emerge fromthe tunnels apparently come back and lay their eggs in the same tunnels,and expand them.

No one knows how long it takes these bees to burrow intosandstone, but once a tunnel is built, it is much more permanent than thetunnels of bees that nest in dirt. Besides permanence, the tunnels appearto have other advantages. The tunnels harbor fewer microbial parasitesthan those in dirt, and they protect the bees from occasional flash floodsbetter than tunnels built in dirt.

Written specially for our valued customers by Dr. Wayne S. Moore. © Copyright Moore Consulting, 2017. All rights reserved.

More information for our valued customers. . .

What’s That Bug in My Ear?

Another study hasconfirmed that cock-

roaches, not earwigs, areby far the most commoninsects that enter people’sears, according to therecords of physicians whohave extracted insects frompeople’s ears.

The report, in the

South Afr ican MedicalJournal, studied insects removed from ears bySouth African hospital physicians over a two yearperiod. Almost half of all insects removed fromears were cockroaches, followed by flies, beetles,moths, and a tick. Cockroaches usually enterpeople’s ears at night as they sleep. Morecockroaches were removed from the ears ofchildren than adults.

These findings are similar to a 1998 study in

a Los Angeles hospital, which found that over ¾of all insects removed from ears at the hospitalwere cockroaches. Weird New Snake

One of the strangest snakes was described as a newspecies in 2006. The spider-tailed viper is from Iran.

This snake has a spider-like appendage on the end of its

tail that it uses to lure in birds. The deadly viper lies perfectly still,well camouflaged among the rocks, just moving its tail end tosimulate a spider walking about. It’s just a matter of time beforean unsuspecting bird flies in to grab what looks like a spider. Whenit does, the viper bites the unfortunate bird and holds it while itsvenom slowly kills it.

YouTube has a fascinating video of this snake luring in and

grabbing a bird.

The Smell of OdorousHouse Ants

Odorous house ants are a commonhousehold ant throughout most of

the U.S. They can easily be mistakenfor other ants, except for theirdistinctive odor when crushed. Theodor is often described on theinternet as rotten coconuts or justcoconuts, but various websitesdescribe the ants as smelling like

blue cheese, rancid butter, cleaner spray, andother scents.

So what do the ants really smell like? Recenttests were conducted that asked people to sniff anddescribe the ant’s smell. Blue cheese was the mostcommon scent chosen, with rotten coconuts thenext most common choice.

Chemical analysis confirms the odor is closestto the smell of blue cheese. The distinctive scentof blue cheese is from the Penicillium mold in it.As coconuts start to rot, they too are colonized byPenicillium mold—which is why some people whoare familiar with the scent of rotting coconutsidentify that odor as how the ants smell.

Now you know what these ants really smelllike, despite the variety of descriptions found onthe internet!

Q. Why do mosquito bites itch?

A. When a mosquito punctures your skinin search of a blood meal, she (onlyfemale mosquitoes bite—they need bloodbefore they can produce a batch ofeggs) also injects some saliva. Thesaliva contains several substances,including a very effective anticoagulant that prevents your bloodfrom clotting while she sucks it up through a thin tube.

The first time we are bitten, nothing happens. But graduallyour body becomes sensitized to the foreign proteins in the saliva anda small itchy red bump appears about 24 hours later. After manymore bites, a pale, swollen hive or wheal appears minutes after thebite, in addition to the red bump 24 hours later. With repeatedbites, some people stop reacting, and others become increasinglyallergic and develop even larger bumps.

The bumps and itching are the result of our own immunesystem recognizing the saliva as a foreign substance and releasinghistamine at the wound. It’s actually our own histamine that makesus itch, not the mosquito’s saliva.

Your Questions Answered