Home owners and local farmers hope that populations of voles regress after reaching record levels the last couple years. Voles live underground forming connected tunnels from which they can consume plant roots, depriving plants of water and nutrients. The population of voles seem to be peaking and hope is the destructive rodent’s numbers will soon take a nosedive. Although guesstimating the vole’s population is very difficult, damage to crops and landscaping shows their numbers are excessively high. Vole populations normally alternate, with populations peaking for three years in interludes of about seven years apart. As in previous years, the vole population will blow up but be quickly be reduced with an occurrence of disease that quickly brings down their numbers.
A cannibal wood ant colony was discovered in abandoned post-Soviet nuclear bunker in Poland. A colony of ants had survived for years after falling into a abandoned bunker with no means of escape, and had stayed alive by deliberately eating the dead members of their own kind. The colony was made up of only worker ants and had no obvious available food source so it was concluded that the thriving community was sustained by cannibalism. A larger ant colony above the bunker was slowly losing workers that accidentally fall through a small ventilation pipes leading into the underground bunker. When they were first found, there were over a million individual ants that couldn’t get back up and out of the bunker. The wood ants were consuming the dead bodies of their fallen buddies that were collecting on the bunker floor. Corpse consumption among wood ants is actually common among nest-mates as a important food source- even when there is no shortage of food.
So how serious is it having lice? Having lice on your head leads to intense itching, then to scratching and can cause sores and secondary bacterial infections on the skin. These pests also pose a psychological problem, as their bites cause a tickling sensation and may result in anxiety, secondary infection and sleeplessness. To make thing worst, body lice can spread the following diseases: epidemic typhus, louse-borne relapsing fever, trench fever and vagabond’s disease ( when body lice infestation are long lasting, heavily bitten areas of the skin can become thickened and darkened). Getting rid of head lice can be done at home with the use of a nit comb, thorough body washing, and all clothing and bed linens should be washed in hot cycles.
Real-life creepy critters can give homeowners a scare this Halloween. While it’s normal to see vampires, ghosts and other creepy crawlers walking up to your front door on Halloween in the form of trick-or-treaters, you don’t want a whole new infestation of bugs inside your house. Parents should be on the lookout for real-life ghoulish pests that come with those costumes purchased from second hand stores or rental stores. Make sure to inspect the costumes for bed bugs, clothes moths and carpet beetle larvae before dressing up to go trick-or-treating. Pay particular attention to the inside seams, looking for any signs of sticky white eggs, shed skins and the bugs themselves. Thirty minutes in the dryer on high heat will take care of these bugs.Having these bugs on the costumes while being worn is one thing but where ever that costume hits the floor or where it is stored, the bugs can infest the house. If you find these pests or any other real-life creepy crawlers hiding within the confines of your home, make sure to contact a licensed pest professional to inspect and treat the problem.
Happy Halloween! –
Ladner and Tsawwassen are gearing up for Halloween in the usual manner.
Spreading fake spider webs, digging grave plots in front yards, carving elaborate
shapes into pumpkins -Halloween season is here. To celebrate this spooky time, Go
Green Pest Control and Exterminators gives you the top five creepiest bugs you
can find in your home.
1. Asian giant
hornet has a wingspan of 3 inches and a stinger that is ¼” long, used to inject venom into the
victim’s body. An individual hornet can kill forty honey bees per minute, that’s
2,400 in an hour.
2. Black Widow
Spiders are notorious killers – as the name and reputation actually come from
the females’ habit of eating her male counterpart after mating. Their bite most
likely won’t kill you, but it will cause some severe pain.
3. Earwigs get
their name because they use their pinchers to burrow through the ear canal into
the brains. Of course, this creepy pest fact is that myth behind its namesake
is totally bogus.
4. Camel Crickets
get their nickname from their back legs, since they resemble those of larger
spiders, leading to myths of mutant spider-crickets. Camel crickets jump toward
people when they feel threatened.
5. Spider Beetles are a common pantry pest that look more like large mites, since the creatures are so small they can infest all kinds of pantry products quickly without being seen. Freezing or throwing away the infested product is a good way to get the bugs out of your pantry. And, they can live for over 8 years without water.
Blog: Rodent-borne diseases spread easily Randy Bilesky / Delta Optimist OCTOBER 28, 2019 10:45 PM Photograph By PIXABAY Tsawwassen Rats and mice are far from being harmless creatures as they can cause infectious diseases & serious health complications. Rodent borne diseases include bacteria-based illnesses such as salmonella to viruses such as hantavirus. Once they have entered and infested your homes, then they can potentially spread several diseases.
When you have an infestation of mice or rats, their urine is the primary source of diseases. Rodent borne-diseases can be contracted by direct contact with the urine, through contaminated food, water and contaminated air. Just like urine, you can catch rodent-borne diseases from rat or mice feces through contamination of food, air and water. Next, an easy way to be infected is by touching a dead rodent and then touching open areas of your body such as mouth, nose and eyes, as well as touching any wounds or scratches. And finally, being scratched or bitten by a rodent can lead to serious health problems, their saliva can contain a multitude of diseases. The most effective solution to rodent infestations is to prevent them from gaining access to your property in the first place.
Rats are generally
pretty shy -they don’t like light and they don’t like people so its kind of a terrifying
when you hear a story about rats attacking people. In a senior apartment
complex when a resident attempted to use the garbage chute, that very thing
happened. A women opened the garbage chute and noticed a rat chewing on kitchen
garbage. As she watched the rat in amazement, a second rat attacked her,
causing deep scratches on her neck. She was rushed to the hospital and after minor
surgery she was okay, but she described the episode as “it was a rat mauling
and it was very scary.”
While rat attacks are very unusual, residents of apartments will often discover rodents in and around their homes. When rats get into an apartment they will leave droppings along the kitchen counters, on the floor and even on couches. Here are a few things residents can do to make themselves less of a target to any rodent: 1- keep counter tops, under stoves, refrigerators and appliances clean. 2- store dry foods in plastic or metal rodent proof containers. 3- clear piles of debris away from house and keep garbage in rodent proof garbage bins.
The Joker, Pennywise, Trump, witches and other scary fictional characters are favorite Halloween creatures, but pests are still pretty high on the list. Bats, spiders and their webs, share holiday honors. A lot of pest-related Halloween items have to do with the historic role they have played in spreading plagues or Black Death that killed a quarter of Europe’s population in the 14th century. Spiders and rats are two pests that have always caused fear. First, spiders and the fear of spiders is called arachnophobia. Two spiders that pose a threat to humans, the black widow and the brown recluse. Their bites are painful and occasionally can even be fatal. Next, rats have been reviled throughout history as they contaminate food and spread disease and can do a great deal of property damage. As the weather turns cooler rats look for harborage inside structures. And finally, bats – bloodsucking supernatural villains that are dirty, winged rodents of the night sky spreading diseases. Of course the bats get a bums rap, as none of that is true.
Rats and mice are far from being harmless creatures as they can cause infectious diseases & serious health complications. Rodent borne diseases include bacteria-based illnesses such as salmonella to viruses such as hantavirus. Once they have entered and infested your homes, then they can potentially spread several diseases. When you have an infestation of mice or rats, their urine is the primary source of diseases. Rodent borne-diseases can be contracted by direct contact with the urine, through contaminated food, water and contaminated air. Just like urine, you can catch rodent-borne diseases from rat or mice feces through contamination of food, air and water. Next, an easy way to be infected is by touching a dead rodent and then touching open areas of your body such as mouth, nose and eyes, as well as touching any wounds or scratches. And finally, being scratched or bitten by a rodent can lead to serious health problems, their saliva can contain a multitude of diseases. The most effective solution to rodent infestations is to prevent them from gaining access to your property in the first place.
