Pest control is considered an essential service as pests don’t stop entering and breeding when locations are closed or shut down. We understand that you will still have unwelcome pest visitors in your home or business which may cause you to feel frustrated, alone, or even scared with all the closures and not know where to turn. Poulin’s Pest Control is still providing services and our staff are taking the proper precautions to keep ourselves and our customers safe.
The top three pests that we deal with on a daily basis are rodents, cockroaches, and bed bugs. These three pests will not be affected by COVID-19 and therefore will not take a break from destroying your belongings, food supply, or spreading their own diseases. This is why it’s important to continue with your scheduled pest control program in times of a crisis! If left unchecked a pest infestation can thrive and multiply creating an even larger problem (harder to control and higher cost to you) for you to deal with in the months ahead.
Below are points to consider about each of our top three pests and why you should not risk waiting it out.
Mice and rats are still happy spending time in our homes and businesses whether we’re there or not. Rodent control programs are important to maintain because:
- Rodents can spread diseases like hantavirus, salmonellosis (food poisoning), hemorrhagic fever, lymphocytic choriomeningitis, rat bite fever, and more.
- Rodents can chew on electoral wiring and start fires.
- Rodents will find any food left in your home or business. With warm buildings and food sources, they can and will reproduce very quickly.
- Stopping or cancelling a pest control service can cause homes and businesses to be overrun with rodents, which will create increased costs for additional control later.
Cockroaches will be just fine in your business without you, feeding on your food supply and multiplying. Even without food, a cockroach can survive for up to 30 days! Cockroach control programs are important to maintain because:
- Cockroaches can spread diseases like salmonella, dysentery, cholera, gastroenteritis, plague, listeriosis, and gardia. They are also known to cause asthma in young or elderly people.
- They only require a small amount of water to survive. As long as there is a source of water, they can live without food for approximately thirty days!
- Maintaining a control program is crucial in the removal of these pests as they continue to reproduce every 34 – 36 days.
- The adult female cockroach can lay eggs that carry anywhere from 30 – 48 nymph cockroaches.
- Stopping or cancelling a program can cause your home or business to become overrun with cockroaches and create increased cost for control and higher risk for potential disease transfer to humans.
Bed bugs are hitchhikers and will follow us wherever we go. Bed bugs will thrive and multiply with hosts that are self-isolating or quarantined. Bed bug control programs are important to maintain because:
- People in quarantine or who are self-isolating create more opportunity for bed bugs to increase in number as hosts will be present more often.
- With more blood meals available to the female bed bugs, they can lay more eggs.
- Bed bugs will be near you in your home and their movement will be less as they have a close food source available.
- Multi-tenant buildings may increase their access to additional hosts. As populations increase in a unit, the higher the risk for bed bugs to migrate to new suites.
- Bed bugs are a nuisance but can cause mental distress and other issues for people whom have bed bugs.
- Maintaining a control program every 10 – 14 days is crucial in reducing future bed bug generations.
Without question we are living in unprecedented times. People throughout Manitoba, Saskatchewan, and Alberta are taking the necessary measures to slow the spread of COVID-19. Unfortunately, the mice and rats, cockroaches, and bed bugs do not get this pandemic flu and will spread unchecked if we let them. That is why the staff at Poulin’s Pest Control remain on the job to protect your homes and businesses from the damaging pests that live all around us. Our staff are following all the medically recommended precautions to keep you and your families safe should the need arise for us to treat your home or business.
Remember, COVID-19 doesn’t affect your food or possessions, mice, rats, and cockroaches do. Pests don’t go away just because the store, restaurant, or location is closed. These are times when if there are issues in a location, continuing your pest control services is essential to protect the food supply, your health and safety, and a great time to rid locations of long-term pest issues.