DIY Pest Control in Toronto: Can They Keep Your Home Safe?
At any time of the year, pests are likely to invade your homes as there are different pests that thrive and come to surface with every season change. While a myriad of household pests can infest your homes, knowing what specific pests each season attracts would help tremendously in making your home prepped up against the invasion, before you even consider calling a pest control company in Toronto.
Common pests that are likely to invite themselves into your homes include fruit flies, rodents, ants, carpet beetles, meal moths, beetles, cockroaches, mites, caterpillars, and stink bugs. But which of these pests are you likely to see during winter? How about when season changes to Spring?
Winter Pests
Just when you thought that the cold weather will keep those bugs away, winter is the season for rodents. These pests are easily attracted to your home as a cozy shelter to replace their natural habitat exposed to the cold weather. Rodents such as arachnids, mice, rats, squirrels, firewood bugs, and raccoons.
Spring Pests
The onset of Spring brings a lot of outdoor pests at your doorstep. Spring pests include carpenter ants, termites, Japanese beetles, spiders, bees, mosquitoes, ticks, skunk, squirrels, raccoons and rabbits.
Summer Pests
With the coming of warm climate and the sun, summer pests are keenly waiting to invade your home. These pests become more active during the warmer months. You can expect to see a lot of mosquitoes, ants, flies, fleas, and roaches as soon as the temperature climbs up.
Fall (Autumn) Pests
Some of the most common pests that are more visible during the cool days in autumn are rats, mice, bed bugs, ants, stink bugs, and cockroaches. Now that you have identified the type of unwanted guests you are likely to have in every season, it’s time to know some Do-It-Yourself pest control in your home. Knowing a little something about these pests will help you understand their behavior and your home’s pest-prone zones.
Once you have established those areas, you can try these DIY tips to prevent these pests from invading your home and get rid of them if they have already taken refuge in the comfort of your cozy abode.
Prevention
As in any infestation threat, prevention is the key. It’s best to start at the source. Some important steps you can take to prevent pests from gaining entry to your homes include:
Make sure that your kitchen countertops and other surfaces are free from odors and food particles. Use 1 part vinegar to 1 part water as your cleaning agent.
Fix and repair leaks – faucets, pipes. Pests need water to survive. Hence, they look for places where there’s water.
Store dry foods to jars and containers that are tightly sealed. This will prevent pests from smelling food aroma. When recycling juice containers or sauce jars, rinse them well before throwing them in the recycling bin.
All trash cans in your home should have a lid.
Keep your drains free from leftover food. You can make a drain cleaning solution by pouring ½ cup of baking soda followed by ½ cup vinegar down the drain. To clear every bit of leftover food or debris, pour boiling water after 5 minutes.
Natural Pest Control Remedies
In addition, you can keep these natural pest control remedies handy. Each one can keep a specific pest out of your home.
Coffee Grounds: By spraying coffee grounds around your doors and windows or any potential point of entry, you are keeping ants at bay. Alternatively, you can use a mixture of 1 cup borax with 1 cup sugar water placed into small jars with lids poked with small holes. The sweet smell will lure ants and get trapped inside.
Apple Cider Vinegar: Fruit flies love the sweet smell of apple cider vinegar. A glass with 2 inches of vinegar will attract these pests. Cover the glass with plastic wrap and poke holes to get the flies in.
Vinegar and Water Spray: Using a spray bottle, mix 1 part of vinegar to 1 part of water. This solution is effective in repelling spiders. You can also spray the solution around cracks, holes, openings or other entry points to prevent the spiders from going in your home.
Beer: You can repel cockroaches by putting beer in saucers and leaving them on floor near entry points.
Essential Oils:
Citronella, lemon eucalyptus, lavender, geranium oils can drive away mosquitoes.
Peppermint oil can repel spiders and ants
Lemongrass oil can keep ticks, fleas and flies out
Rosemary oil can repel fleas and ticks
When to call for Professional Help
Sure, some of these preventative DIY methods can help thwart any possible pest infestation. But how do you tackle pests that are already inside your home and keeping themselves cozy and multiplying at a rate you don’t even want to think about? While doing your own pest control steps are recommended as an initial action, calling for a pest control expert in Toronto will provide services that will manage pest control with ultimate goal of making these pests out of your home permanently.
Common pests that are likely to invite themselves into your homes include fruit flies, rodents, ants, carpet beetles, meal moths, beetles, cockroaches, mites, caterpillars, and stink bugs. But which of these pests are you likely to see during winter? How about when season changes to Spring?
Winter Pests
Just when you thought that the cold weather will keep those bugs away, winter is the season for rodents. These pests are easily attracted to your home as a cozy shelter to replace their natural habitat exposed to the cold weather. Rodents such as arachnids, mice, rats, squirrels, firewood bugs, and raccoons.
Spring Pests
The onset of Spring brings a lot of outdoor pests at your doorstep. Spring pests include carpenter ants, termites, Japanese beetles, spiders, bees, mosquitoes, ticks, skunk, squirrels, raccoons and rabbits.
Summer Pests
With the coming of warm climate and the sun, summer pests are keenly waiting to invade your home. These pests become more active during the warmer months. You can expect to see a lot of mosquitoes, ants, flies, fleas, and roaches as soon as the temperature climbs up.
Fall (Autumn) Pests
Some of the most common pests that are more visible during the cool days in autumn are rats, mice, bed bugs, ants, stink bugs, and cockroaches. Now that you have identified the type of unwanted guests you are likely to have in every season, it’s time to know some Do-It-Yourself pest control in your home. Knowing a little something about these pests will help you understand their behavior and your home’s pest-prone zones.
Once you have established those areas, you can try these DIY tips to prevent these pests from invading your home and get rid of them if they have already taken refuge in the comfort of your cozy abode.
Prevention
As in any infestation threat, prevention is the key. It’s best to start at the source. Some important steps you can take to prevent pests from gaining entry to your homes include:
Make sure that your kitchen countertops and other surfaces are free from odors and food particles. Use 1 part vinegar to 1 part water as your cleaning agent.
Fix and repair leaks – faucets, pipes. Pests need water to survive. Hence, they look for places where there’s water.
Store dry foods to jars and containers that are tightly sealed. This will prevent pests from smelling food aroma. When recycling juice containers or sauce jars, rinse them well before throwing them in the recycling bin.
All trash cans in your home should have a lid.
Keep your drains free from leftover food. You can make a drain cleaning solution by pouring ½ cup of baking soda followed by ½ cup vinegar down the drain. To clear every bit of leftover food or debris, pour boiling water after 5 minutes.
Natural Pest Control Remedies
In addition, you can keep these natural pest control remedies handy. Each one can keep a specific pest out of your home.
Coffee Grounds: By spraying coffee grounds around your doors and windows or any potential point of entry, you are keeping ants at bay. Alternatively, you can use a mixture of 1 cup borax with 1 cup sugar water placed into small jars with lids poked with small holes. The sweet smell will lure ants and get trapped inside.
Apple Cider Vinegar: Fruit flies love the sweet smell of apple cider vinegar. A glass with 2 inches of vinegar will attract these pests. Cover the glass with plastic wrap and poke holes to get the flies in.
Vinegar and Water Spray: Using a spray bottle, mix 1 part of vinegar to 1 part of water. This solution is effective in repelling spiders. You can also spray the solution around cracks, holes, openings or other entry points to prevent the spiders from going in your home.
Beer: You can repel cockroaches by putting beer in saucers and leaving them on floor near entry points.
Essential Oils:
Citronella, lemon eucalyptus, lavender, geranium oils can drive away mosquitoes.
Peppermint oil can repel spiders and ants
Lemongrass oil can keep ticks, fleas and flies out
Rosemary oil can repel fleas and ticks
When to call for Professional Help
Sure, some of these preventative DIY methods can help thwart any possible pest infestation. But how do you tackle pests that are already inside your home and keeping themselves cozy and multiplying at a rate you don’t even want to think about? While doing your own pest control steps are recommended as an initial action, calling for a pest control expert in Toronto will provide services that will manage pest control with ultimate goal of making these pests out of your home permanently.
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