Top 5 Spring Cleaning Tips That Dramatically Reduce Pest Problems

The return of pests after winter is one of the most unpleasant elements of spring, with many of them awakening from their winter dormancy to invade our homes and yards in search of food and places to nest. Spring is also the time when many of us clean and reorganize our homes to have a fresh feeling after winter with many often performing deeper cleans than they may perform on a daily or weekly basis. This provides the perfect excuse to put some extra effort into your spring cleaning to reduce pest problems. In today’s blog we will be providing you with our top 5 spring cleaning tips that will dramatically reduce the season’s pest problems.

Re-secure Your Home

Winter will often place undue wear and tear on the exterior of your home, wearing down seals and creating cracks that pests can then use to access your home. When spring rolls around it is the perfect time to check your home’s exterior for pest access points and seal them off. This can involve sealing cracks with caulk or some other sealant, replacing damaged window screens, replacing the seals around windows and doors, repairing loose mortar and ensuring that any vents and utility openings are covered with mesh, so pests don’t have an easy access point.

Declutter

Pests love clutter, it provides them with places to nest that are outside of the regular view of the home’s residents. Therefor one of the best spring-cleaning tips to reduce pest problems is to reduce clutter in your home. Pay close attention to places like basement storage areas and your garage as these areas are often prime pest habitats due to their lack of human activity and in the case of your garage, its regular exposure to the outside. You can also use this decluttering to remove cardboard storage boxes and replace them with lidded plastic containers. Lidded plastic containers deny pest access more effectively than cardboard and don’t provide them with any additional nesting material.

Deep clean your Pantry

The places where we store our food are the places we want to find pests the least, unfortunately they are also one of the main places in our homes that pests are attracted to. You can reduce the odds of your pantry attracting pests by taking several steps during your spring cleaning. First, you should completely empty out your pantry so you can vacuum the whole thing out to remove any residual crumbs or other food particles that pests can snack on. Throw out any stale or expired dry goods like cereals, lentils, flour and other grains. Invest in solid storage containers made out of plastic or glass that can be tightly sealed, these will both prevent pest access and reduce food smells that may attract pests.

Eliminate Sources of Moisture

Areas in your home with excess moisture run the risk of attracting pests like silverfish and cockroaches, which thrive in moist environments. Eliminating moisture in places like bathrooms, under sinks and in your basement will help prevent these pests. You should also keep your eyes open for any leaks as these both pose a risk to your home and can act as a pest attractant.

Tidy Your Yard

As your yard is outdoors it is difficult to keep 100% pest free but there are some steps that can be taken to ensure your yard is less attractive to pests as well as making sure they don’t have a good way to access your home. Trim back any shrubs, bushes or trees that touch your home as these often act as homes for pests and can act as access points for the interior of your home. Tidy up any piles of leaves or other yard debris as these can act as excellent pest habitats. Clean any debris that has accumulated in your gutters as blocked gutters can lead to water pooling which can provide a spawning area for mosquitoes and other types of flies. Replace old mulch with cedar as it has been known to repel many types of pests, you should also make sure that your mulch isn’t in contact with your home’s foundation.

We hope we have been able to provide you with some useful tips to drastically reduce pest problems in the spring. If you have any questions about professional pest control services, please feel free to contact us.

Gilpin’s Pest Control is a family-owned business operating on the Lower Mainland in Greater Vancouver and the BC Interior including Kamloops, Revelstoke, and Sicamous. After 35 years in the business, we do a stellar job and are proud of our rapid response time. 

If you have any questions about this article or you would like to talk to us about pest control needs, please call us toll-free at (800) 770-2428.