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How to Tell What Household Pest You Have
How to Tell What Household Pest You Have. It's not always easy to identify which pest you have in your home, but learning to distinguish a few characteristics of their damage may help you. Common household pests include ants, cockroaches, termites, fleas and rodents, such as rats and mice. Your home or items can also fall victim to various food...
It's not always easy to identify which pest you have in your home, but learning to distinguish a few characteristics of their damage may help you. Common household pests include ants, cockroaches, termites, fleas and rodents, such as rats and mice. Your home or items can also fall victim to various food pests such as moths and beetles, clothes pests or other pests, such as bed bugs. If you are unsure and cannot figure out your pest, consider calling a pest-control company to aid you in discovering the pest and controlling it.
Identify the damage the pest is causing. Examples of damage might be holes chewed in kitchen boxes or clothing; droppings around the home; piles of sawdust; or if you discover bites on you or your family. Mice and rats will chew holes in kitchen food containers, may chew holes in your walls for access and leave their droppings on counters or near baseboards. Certain moths, such as clothes moths, will make small holes in your clothing, particularly wool, furs or similar fibers.
Search for more evidence of the pest. If you suspect mice or rats, set live-traps around the baseboards or behind small appliances on your kitchen counter. If you've seen ants, but are not sure if they're causing damage, consider using ant baits per instructions to see if they take it. If you suspect insect food pests, check all of your dried goods, particularly spices and anything made with grain for small webs, larvae (will look like worms or grubs) or adults flying about your pantry.
Capture an adult specimen of the pest, if possible. Using traps and baits will help. Once you have captured a pest, it will be simpler to identify it. Cockroaches are brown with long antennae. Meal moths inhabit your pantry and food products, including pet and bird foods. They are small moths with coppery-brownish-white wings. Clothes moths are also small, and will inhabit closets with animal furs or wool products. Several beetles will also inhabit your home and may destroy your foods or carpets. Fleas are small, black or reddish-brown insects that leap great distances and cause irritating bites. Bed bugs inhabit furniture and mattresses and will leave small red bumps where they bite you.
Take or send the specimen to a local university or local university's cooperative extension. The entomology experts will help you identify your pest. You can also call a pest-control company to come in and offer suggestions on controlling the pest species.
