It may sometimes seem that we are at the mercy of pests, that they are capable of overwhelming our homes in spite of our best efforts! But with a little knowledge of pest biology and some creative thinking, even the layperson can take appropriate and effective steps to make his or her home less inviting to pests like cockroaches and ants.
Here’s a brief lesson in pest biology and ecology that I hope you enjoy!
Every pest that we deal with needs three things to survive (just as we do!) – food, shelter, and water. We hear a great deal about Integrated Pest Management (IPM) these days – and while IPM may include relatively technical considerations such as pitting one insect against another (biological control) or resistance management (rotating control products to prevent insects from adapting to them), it can be as simple as depriving pests of one or more of the three essential requirements listed above.
Consider a typical back yard…Every environment has what ecologists call a “carrying capacity” – that is, every environment contains resources sufficient to sustain a certain number of organisms. Stay with me here, it’s really quite simple! Let’s take a look at a graphic representation:
The green dashed line represents the number of bugs that the environment can support (carrying capacity). The red line represents the number of bugs in that environment over time. This number tends to vary around the carrying capacity. Now, let’s take the same graph, and include a pest treatment:
As you can see, the pest treatment was successful and the bug population dropped dramatically. However, without somehow altering the environment to accommodate fewer pests, the population rebounds to previous levels over time. As an example, consider a backyard with a woodpile close to the house. The woodpile represents all three essentials for life – food (a variety of bugs and fungi may live there and serve as food for pests), water (woodpiles retain moisture), and shelter (plenty of cracks and crevices for pests to hide!). Let’s consider the same graph again, but this time in addition to a pest treatment we move the woodpile from the back yard to an area away from the house:
This time, pest populations drop with the pest treatment, and are unable to rebound to previous levels because a major source of food, water, and shelter has been removed from the environment. Bingo! More effective pest prevention, less need for chemical control, and greater protection for your home and family! Here’s a brief list of very common conditions that increase the carrying capacity for pests in and around homes:
Our philosophy is in our name – Black Pest Prevention – and we believe in encouraging our customers to take appropriate steps to help us reduce pest populations around their homes through IPM. That is why we conduct a thorough inspection on each quarterly visit, designed to identify conditions that favor pests, and communicate that information to our customers.
Next time, springtails….as always, thanks for reading!