Mice, bats, rats, birds, bees, ants, termites – all of these creatures have one thing in common: they can infiltrate your home and cause all kinds of problems. Do they do this on purpose? Of course not! They’re just living their lives and happen to stumble upon your home. In most cases, pests are only there because your house presents some good conditions to live and survive. When you put it like that, you almost feel rude about getting rid of them. Unfortunately, pests can be just that: a pest that is a big health risk in your home. They can wreck your property, causing damage to your home decor and making your life hell. Have you ever tried to sleep with a mouse squeaking and scratching between your walls?!
You must do something about pests, but there’s a certain way to approach the situation. People think they know how to handle it, but you’re often very far from the correct path. With that in mind, here’s what you absolutely should not do when you find pests in your home:
Leave them alone
Yes, they don’t know what they’re doing. Yes, they might be enjoying their lives in your home. However, you can’t leave pests alone. As mentioned above, they do cause damage to your property, even if they don’t mean it. You can get cute pests – like squirrels or some birds – but you shouldn’t leave them alone or try to turn them into pets. Likewise, you shouldn’t try to ignore the problem or put off solving it for days, weeks and months.
When you leave pests alone, they’ll carry on doing what they’ve been doing. They’re not going to wake up one day and think ‘wow, this homeowner is being really nice letting us stay here, let’s be a bit more respectful!’ No, they’ll just breed, do more damage to your home, and cause further problems. So, the moment you notice a pest, do something about it.
Take things into your own hands
When you decide to take action, the worst thing you can do is take things into your own hands. You’d like to think that you can deal with a rodent infestation – even if it’s only one or two small mice. However, it’s never a good idea to try to remove pests on your own. For starters, you have no idea what diseases they might be carrying. Wild rodents can have all sorts of diseases on them, and different insects may cause harm if they bite you.
Secondly, you don’t know how a pest will react if you try to get it to leave. Some may scamper away afraid, but others may stand up and fight. This is particularly true of things like wasps, bees, and some birds. They react badly when their hives or nests are threatened, so they try to fight back. Unless you enjoy being chased around by an angry pest, you should probably avoid taking action.
Thirdly, let’s be honest, you have no idea what you’re doing. Have you ever removed a pest before? You don’t know the correct tactics, nor do you know how to clean up after they’ve been removed. The chances are you will do more harm than good – to both your house and the pest. Some people have ruined their homes by trying to deal with pests on their own, it’s simply not worth taking the risk.
Finally, taking things into your own hands is a bad idea because you can waste so much money. If you go on Amazon or Google and search for pest control products, you’ll be presented with a plethora of possibilities. There are so many gadgets that claim to help get rid of pests in an instant. You will waste loads of money buying these products and realising they don’t work. In the end, you spend a fortune on dodgy items, but the pests are still where they are. You’re much better off calling in some pest control experts to take care of things for you. At least that will be an expense that’s worth the money.
Take lethal action
This can actually come under the other point, but it also relates to when you choose pest control service providers. A lot of people try to remove pests by using lethal or inhumane means. The most common example of this is a mousetrap. You set them up around your home, and you kill the mice. It works, but it’s just not a very ethical way of doing things. Especially as these poor creatures are literally just looking for a safe place to live.
Moreover, many household pests are an endangered species. Bees, for example, are commonly found swarming households or gardens, but they need to be preserved. If you take lethal action – like spraying poison down – you kill some vital creatures in our ecosystem. Instead, you’d need some ethical bee removal services to carefully move the bees to a safer location away from your home. The same goes for bats and many other pests – lethal measures might work, but you’d be killing endangered creatures.
In most cases, a lethal approach is never right. So, when you look for pest control options, search for companies that provide ethical means of getting rid of pests. This way, you can feel safe knowing that the pests will be removed, and also that they’re not being killed. Of course, there are some cases where this isn’t possible. Ant and termite infestations are commonly only solved through lethal means. Sure, you can try to find a better alternative, but it’s not always the case.
Have you noticed any pests in your home or garden? If so, make sure you don’t do any of the things mentioned above. Instead, you should take immediate action, call in some experts, and avoid lethal measures. Also, as a final point, make sure you take preventative measures after the problem is dealt with. This will prevent any pests from returning, offering a long-term solution to your problem.
