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Pest Control


CapeFish

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For most of my life, pest control involved some spraying outside the house with stuff you bought at the garden store along with the use of tennis shoes.........then I moved to Tallahassee.

It was to the point where I had to call in the pros to control roaches, ants, and any other critters. I called Capelouto where I pay $69 every two months for service. I recently had a carpenter ant colony move in and a very panicked Capelouto seems to have taken care of it with a Termidor treatment....all under my contract at no extra cost. Never knew you could use Termidor to treat ants, but this says otherwise.

What does everyone up here do to control the pests?

I thought we had pests in Southern Florida.....WRONG!

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For most of my life, pest control involved some spraying outside the house with stuff you bought at the garden store along with the use of tennis shoes.........then I moved to Tallahassee.

It was to the point where I had to call in the pros to control roaches, ants, and any other critters. I called Capelouto where I pay $69 every two months for service. I recently had a carpenter ant colony move in and a very panicked Capelouto seems to have taken care of it with a Termidor treatment....all under my contract at no extra cost. Never knew you could use Termidor to treat ants, but this says otherwise.

What does everyone up here do to control the pests?

I thought we had pests in Southern Florida.....WRONG!

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I have my house checked/sprayed...whatever they do for termites yearly. The pest guys always comment that for an 80 yr old house, there are not signs of termite damage, past or present. That really seems to impress them, so like you say the problems must be rampant in this area. However I must say I've had the opposite experience than you. My bug/ant/pest problems were always worse in SFL than they have been in NFL.

I do not have our house sprayed indoors at all. I just don't trust breathing all those chemicals in my house. To me, and I have no evidence/facts for you for except my own paranoid opinion, but I think spraying these chemicals continuously in your house is just a recipe for cancer. Maybe that paranoia comes from the fact that in the 70's and 80's my mother was adamant about having our house sprayed. I remember the sickly chemical smell the house would have all day after the spraying each month. I am sure the chemicals are much better these days than back in those years and probably any damages to my health (if any) by these sprays has already been done. But you know we can be haunted by things from our childhood. :)

I do buy those roach traps a few times a year for the large cockroaches (palmetto bugs) and that seems to keep them out. I've never had ant problems, but I do have a spider that set up shop at the top of my kitchen window sill while I was gone to CA for two weeks. I find it interesting to watch her (just a common household spider) since she's high up and out of the way and she does catch a few bugs in her web. I just hope she doesn't have a zillion babies up there...if so....I'll have to go and find the spray. :(

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I've not encountered many pests in any of my places since I began living alone. Call it good fortune or good sanitation. There was a time, when I moved into my last apartment 3 years ago, perhaps the first week, when it seemed everywhere I turned there was a roach... of course I had not yet moved my furniture in, nor slept a single night there. They called out their pest man, and I brought in some of those black square roach motel things and never saw the black nasties again.

I tend to keep moth balls handy, they seem to help repel the critters. Doesn't hurt to have a little Hot Shot spray too.

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I keep my house clean and don't keep piles of paper or whatever around. I think the main thing that keeps the roaches out of my place (it's old and wood, so I should see more than I do) is that my eaves are full of geckos. Those suckers eat so many of the local bugs that I seldom have any problem. They do "talk" loudly enough to startle anyone not used to them, though. I always laugh when a new visitor hears a strange voice saying "GECK-O! GECK-O! GECK-O!" and jumps.

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We never had a bug problem in our apartment when we first moved to Tally, probably something to do with living on the second floor I guess. Having never dealt with a insect infestation I didn't consider the possibility when we were deciding to purchase a home smack dab in the middle of a forest. There are spiders all over the house/yard and rarely a day passes where I don't do the "I just walked into a cobweb, please get it off me" dance.

Suprisingly though, we still have very little trouble with bugs in the house. An occasional spider or creepy crawly. We had a roach problem in the garage when we moved in but it put down some traps and seem to have controlled the problem. We do carry a termite bond but haven't ever had a termite problem.

I've been considering having the outside treated for spiders, mostly so they'll clean the cobwebs off the house but haven't bitten the bullet, we are still using the home depot bug protection method, which is probably completely ineffectual but gives me some peace of mind. :)

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CapeFish, I wasn't trying to throw my pesticide paranoia at you or have you feel guilty about what you've done. I think faced w/the same situation that you were, I would have acted in the same manner. My friend's house in Lauderdale was being eaten alive by carpenter ants. Glad you've taken steps to get rid of them.

Rachiroo I know that spider dance, I do it often. That situation can be especially spooky at night when you have about five lines hanging off your body especially on your head and face.

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CapeFish, I wasn't trying to throw my pesticide paranoia at you or have you feel guilty about what you've done. I think faced w/the same situation that you were, I would have acted in the same manner. My friend's house in Lauderdale was being eaten alive by carpenter ants. Glad you've taken steps to get rid of them.
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I have pesticide paranoia too :lol:

Now I know why people keep pest control in Tally.....you have to. While I have Capelouto on service contract (It goes month-to-month from now on :D ) I am going to make sure that I get this all under control. But Capelouto's pesticides are outside the house. Only things for the inside they have told me they could offer me are the gels for roaches and fogging the house.

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I have sugar ants in my house. I have kept the counter cleaned and put out that sugarly sweet poision and they still run around. I think they came inside to get water.

I used to have a roach issue but they went away. I see the sliverly bugs run around once in a while. What are they? are they dangerous?

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I have sugar ants in my house. I have kept the counter cleaned and put out that sugarly sweet poision and they still run around. I think they came inside to get water.

I used to have a roach issue but they went away. I see the sliverly bugs run around once in a while. What are they? are they dangerous?

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Those sugar ants or whatever the proper name is are very hard to get rid of....good luck DD5!

While I'm not much of a spider fan, you gotta say that banana spiders are very cool to see. I've got one that has been living all summer in between the shrubs in perfect view of my sunroom windows. Rachiroo you'll be happy to know I never walk over there at night.

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Oh my. We need to have an anti unit of the same type to handle such an occurance if it were to happen in the Capital Area. With all of the Banana spiders we have around here, I'd hate to see something happen to a small child and there not be any way to treat them locally.

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No no these spiders at my house and Rachiroo's house are called banana spiders and also Golden Silk Spiders. I don't think they are poisonous at all. Capefish, the poisonous ones you are referring to are the brown banana spiders from South America. They don't usually live in FL especially this far north. They come over in banana box shipments from South America. They are not to be messed with. It explains it all in the article I linked you guys to above. :)

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Oh my. We need to have an anti unit of the same type to handle such an occurance if it were to happen in the Capital Area. With all of the Banana spiders we have around here, I'd hate to see something happen to a small child and there not be any way to treat them locally.
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