HOUSEHOLD PESTS

Michael Holigan: American home owners spend about five billion dollars every year battling household pests. Cockroaches and ants can invade any home in any part of the country. But pest control experts are finding new ways to help home owners fight back more effectively. Stoy, why do we even have pests?

Stoy Hedges: Well Michael, if you think about it, pests need the same things that we need to survive. They need food, water, warmth and they need shelter. And we provide everything in our homes for that environment. We keep our houses about 70, 72 degrees. We bring food in, we cook it. We have sinks and water and the insects need those things and a lot of insects have adapted themselves to living inside people homes.

MH: So it's easier for them to live inside than outside.

S.H.: It depends on the pests, but many of the pest we have continually move inside from the outside and other pests, like the German cockroach, are ideally suited to live in our environment. In fact, they require us to move them from building to building. They can't do it on their own. We're their caretakers. We're almost like their little slaves, that we can give them everything that they need to survive and proliferate and the more of that we give them, the more they proliferate and then become big problems in some people's homes.

MH: Which pests are the most common?

S.H.: Well, probably people have most concerns about cockroaches, particularly the German cockroach, which is the number one pest in the world. The American cockroach, the Smoky Brown cockroach, up north we have the Oriental cockroach. There's a number of different cockroaches that come into people's houses.

MH: What's really the key to controlling pests?

S.H.: Well the key is to think like a pest. I mean, I have an old professor who says, "Think like a cockroach.", and in many respects that's true. For example, where should you put your pest control materials? It's where the pests live or where they breed. And most of the time cockroaches, ants, are found in cracks and voids. So most of the applications that we need to make to treat those need to be made to those areas. The other places that pests might be living are in boxes or similar places like that or under the house or in the attic. And those are again voids, cracks and areas like that. So we have to adapt our treatment procedures and treat pests where they live, rather than where we hope they might crawl and we'll have much better success.

MH: So like around cabinets or food storage areas you've got cracks and voids, how do you get into those areas?

S.H.: What we use is a little device called an Insider that provides a permanent treatment point that we put into the wall and allows us to treat that void when we need to to help prevent pests problems and also to help control pest problems.

MH: Well, if you have some Insiders installed and you're getting them treated regularly, is that all you need to do?

S.H.: Pest just continually move in. It's nature and action.

MH: Never ending battle.

S.H.: Yeah, never ending battle, so we try to make sure that we prevent pests from coming in so you don't see them inside and we take them and treat them outside where they live. And if the manage to get inside then we try to hunt down where they're living inside and treat them there.

MH: How often do you need to treat them?

S.H.: Not as often as you'd think in terms of having to retreat those voids. Once we've treated them once, but think about where pests come from. Ninety-eight percent of the pests we deal with come from the outside of your home. So you always got a constant threat of pest invasion. The older the home is, the more mature your landscaping is, the more insects and other pests you have living around your home.

MH: Is part of the problem with pest is poor house keeping?

S.H.: Oh, not necessarily. Even the cleanest houses can have many types of pests. Even, as we said before, brand new houses that nobody has lived in can have pests. So there's a lot of pests that can come in and move in and live. But if you are to allow your house to get dirty or you'd have more poor sanitation or something like that, more pests could survive, but that doesn't mean that just because you keep your house clean that you won't have any pests.

Episode 47 1996 - 97 Season

| Solid Surface Countertops | Household Pests | Easy Trac | Installation of Solid Surface Countertops | Self-Employed Buyers |

Purchase Video