We can’t tolerate pests that damage food, cause illness, or threaten safety. In restaurants, a single pest can shut down operations until the problem is dealt with.
Preventing pests starts with eliminating entry points like open windows, repairing screens, and sealing utility openings with caulk. This also includes cleaning storage areas and removing clutter where pests can breed. Contact Pest Control Van Nuys now!
Step 1 is prevention, which involves taking steps to keep pests from getting into a structure or area. This usually means keeping doors and windows shut, repairing leaking faucets, and eliminating food sources that attract pests (such as stacks of newspaper or cardboard). It also includes regular cleaning and prompt removal of garbage.
Step 2 is to learn as much as possible about a particular pest. This helps you understand why it is there and what it needs to survive. It will also help you decide whether it is causing harm and should be controlled. Step 3 is to use control methods to reduce pest numbers to an acceptable level. This may involve using chemical or physical barriers. Chemicals are often more effective, but can cause health and environmental concerns if used improperly or overused. Physical barriers, on the other hand, are generally less hazardous and can be more permanent.
Step 4 is to monitor the situation and take further action as needed. This includes re-assessing the risks of continuing to use a pesticide or deciding to change control strategies. It may be necessary to move to other pest management strategies, such as eradication or other physical controls, especially when a pest is found in enclosed environments where it can do more harm than in the open outdoors. Eradication is rarely an objective in outdoor pest situations, but it can be attempted when a specific pest has reached unacceptable levels in indoor areas such as dwellings, schools and hospitals; retail and food preparation facilities; or other public buildings. It is also an important objective for some crops, such as olive trees in Italy and gypsy moths in North America, where the pest has caused extensive damage and destruction that cannot be tolerated. Eradication in these cases is an attempt to destroy the entire population of a pest, which can be a difficult and time-consuming task. Some pest populations are continuous, requiring constant monitoring and control measures; others are sporadic or migratory and require only occasional control measures. In some cases, such as a bed bug infestation in hotels, eradication is the only way to completely eliminate the pest from a building.
Suppression
Suppression methods restrict pests by interrupting the interaction between organisms that sustain them (predator-prey; parasite-host; disease-host; herbivore-plant). For example, if an insect pest population is growing too rapidly, you can use cultural practices to disrupt this process. Cultural controls include frequent scouting and removal of infected plant material, crop rotation, plowing, tillage and mulching to deprive pests of their favorable habitat, managing irrigation schedules to prevent long periods of high humidity and other conditions that encourage disease development, and storing and cleaning equipment properly to avoid transmitting diseases.
Chemical control is most effective when pest populations are low or in small numbers. Spraying a small amount of a chemical when the population is low can often suppress it without damaging the crop. However, this approach is not suitable for continuous pests or sporadic or migratory pests. If you do apply a chemical, choose one that is “soft” on natural enemies, and don’t forget to keep scouting to detect and report any problems.
Physical barriers that can be used to inhibit the movement of pests include traps, screens, fences and nets. Also, pheromones, juvenile hormones and other natural insect chemicals can control pests in some situations.
Biological control involves the conservation and release of natural enemies to reduce pest densities or make them less damaging. Examples include beneficial mites that feed on pests in orchards, the parasitic nematodes that kill harmful soil grubs, and Encarsia formosa, a wasp that parasitizes greenhouse whitefly. Many biological control agents are commercially available.
Eradication is a rarely-used goal in outdoor pest control, although it is sometimes attempted in enclosed areas, such as homes, hospitals and food processing plants. In such cases, the pest may be a weed, such as purple loosestrife or gypsy moth, or a disease, such as fire ant infestations.
Eradication can be successful when the pest is not well-adapted to its new environment, when other methods are too expensive or difficult to implement, and when action is required by esthetic, health or economic concerns (see Thresholds within the Assessment page). It’s also important to monitor the success or failure of corrective measures taken to eradicate the pest, so that appropriate action can be taken when the situation arises again.
Eradication
Pest control is the process of limiting the population of unwanted insects, rodents and other organisms. Pests can cause health and safety issues, such as contaminating food, making asthma or allergies worse, and damaging property and the environment. Safe pest control is a team effort, with building and site owners, managers, supervisors, and residents all playing their parts. Everyone can do their part by reporting cleaning or maintenance problems to the appropriate person, keeping living areas clean and closing off entry points, and avoiding chemical pesticides that can pose a risk to the environment and human health.
There are many methods for preventing pests from causing damage, including physical trapping and deterrence. Some examples include putting up flypaper near problem areas, using traps for mice or rats, and blocking access to cracks with steel wool or caulking. Preventive steps also include removing scraps of food and sealing any entrance points, such as openings around doors, windows, and vents.
When preventive measures fail, chemical pest control may be needed to address severe infestations or insect populations. Chemicals are typically more effective than natural controls, and can be purchased in the form of sprays, baits, or liquids. Some examples include repellents that discourage pests by creating a repugnant smell or taste, and insecticides that kill the creatures. The chemicals used in this type of control can be dangerous to people and the environment, and must be carefully applied and disposed of, but they can offer rapid results.
Biological or biologically based pest controls are those that use a naturally occurring enemy of the targeted pest to reduce its numbers. Examples of these include the introduction of predators or parasites that attack the pest, such as nematodes (microscopic worms) that eat or engulf fleas, grubs, and ants. When choosing this kind of control, it is important to understand the pest’s life cycle, as certain stages are more susceptible to predators and parasites than others. When necessary, these types of controls should be supplemented with other means of control to ensure success. For example, the beneficial nematode Steinernema carpocapsae can be sprayed on crop fields to target fleas, grubs, ants, and other harmful organisms that feed on crops.
Monitoring
Observing, tracking and assessing pest populations to determine when control action is needed and whether control methods are working. Monitoring can be done through trapping, scouting, or visual inspection. It may involve checking environmental conditions to help predict when pest populations will hit threshold levels.
Thresholds are the numbers at which pests must be controlled to prevent unacceptable damage or injury. Pest monitoring allows pest management professionals to track population trends so that they can take prompt action when a pest problem begins to occur. Monitoring also helps a company know when the number of pests has fallen below the threshold level and that control efforts have been successful.
Monitoring is typically done through scouting or trapping, although it can also be performed by sampling or testing the environment for evidence of pest presence and activity. Typical examples of pests that are monitored include insect, insect-like and weed pests; mollusks; vertebrates (birds, rodents, other mammals, etc); and microbial or fungus pests. There are also a number of methods to detect pests including eDNA analysis and pheromone trapping.
Insect monitors work 24/7 and can be your eyes when you are not at the account, particularly for a facility with constant product flow or where it is impossible to go through all areas of the site. They can be set to trap a wide range of pests including house fly, fruit flies, stored-product insects and fabric pests. In some cases, they can even capture a specific pest life stage which is very useful information for finding a harborage point.
Some monitors, such as the ‘passive’ style of trap, simply contain a bait that attracts and then catches the pest. Other types of monitors use physical shapes, specialized trapping materials and the use of attractants or pheromones to exploit pest behavior and increase catch rates. For example, the use of a manufactured copy of a female insect pheromone can confuse male insects and prevent mating, reducing population levels.
Often, a company will monitor both the exterior and interior of a facility depending on its history with infestation problems and its conducive factors for pests. External inspections must focus on locations that provide excess moisture, food sources and shelter as well as on structural issues that can promote pest infestations. Internal inspections must be able to identify problem areas of the facility, sanitation issues and employee habits that can contribute to pest intrusion.
