Bolton Pest Control

Archive for August, 2011

Breeding rats is very easy and it can also be very profitable, rats are used as pets by thousands of people, and they are also used as live food for some large snakes and reptiles. If you decide to raise and breed rats, you can either sell them as pets in the local newspaper or other publications, or sell them as live food to snake and other reptile owners, or you can sell them directly to pet shops, where they will sell them as both pets and live food.

Rats come in different colors and species, you should pick out adult males of the same species and the colors that you wish to breed. Ensure that your mating adults are very healthy and free from any diseases or other problems, you want to give the offspring the best chance of being strong and healthy as possible, in other words you don’t want to pass along a strain of bad genes to another generation of rats.

The perfect home for raising rats is an aquarium, the heavy glass is great as it allows you to clearly see the rats easily from all sides. Rats do not need a heating source like a lot of other creatures do, such as some fish, crickets or grasshoppers. In fact rats are able to survive just fine in pretty harsh conditions. I mean they have no trouble living in old abandon buildings in the winter that have no heating source, so if your apartment or house where you live is comfortable for you, it will be fine for your rats also. If you keep them in some garage or shed outside, then you should invest in a heating pad made for reptiles and amphibians, called UTH, or ‘ Under Tank Heaters ‘. These heating pads can be safely placed under the aquariums, keeping your rats warm during the harsh winter.

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You will want to line your rats home with folded newspapers, as it’s the perfect bedding. Some people also like using the shredded wood chips, as it’s pretty cheap, I recommend placing the shredded wood in one side of the aquarium and the newspapers in the other side, but that is entirely up to you. I have seen rat homes filled entirely with shredded wood, and they seem to live and breed fine in it with no problems at all.

Your rats will need a shallow dish of fresh water, and another dish of food to keep them happy and healthy. You can buy good food for them at most pet stores, or order it online. Once you have the aquarium or home ready for your adult rats, they will start breeding pretty quickly and very often. It doesn’t take too long before you have a lot of rats. The baby rats can live right in the same home as the adult rats, and get along fine. I mean there is nobody to separate them from the adults in the wild, and there sure seems to be a lot of rats around.

Occasionally you will see an adult rat eat some of the young, but that usually occurs when an adult rat is starving or has some other problems. Separating them is up to you, you should observe them often and remove any dead ones, before they start smelling up the whole room. Like in any birth, some newborns may die within minutes or even days after being born. Raising and breeding rats is easy and fun, and it will keep you busy all winter during the long, cold months, it’s an activity that can be very profitable and it’s also a great way to help beat the winter blues.

There is a website that describes numerous activities and other methods to help eliminate the Winter Blues, this website is called: Winter Activities – and it may be found at this url: http://www.winter-activities.com

You may publish this article in your ezine, newsletter or on your web site as long as it is reprinted in its entirety and without modification except for formatting needs or grammar corrections.  
Robert W. Benjamin has been involved in weight loss and has been researching the Winter Blues for a few years. He has personally turned his life around at the age of 50, by reducing his body weight from 400 lbs to 185 lbs. If you want to turn your life around, and read other great info and ideas on beating the winter blues, please check out the website below:Winter Activitieshttp://www.winter-activities.com
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We tend to’ve all eaten honey, and many folks supplement our diets by eating beneficial bee byproducts like bee pollen. But, there are plenty of completely different species of bees; that ones build honey, and what do other kinds of bees do?

There are regarding twenty five,000 identified species of bees worldwide (about four,000 in the United States), all of that are classified underneath the superfamily Apoidea. These are divided into nine families, four of that are very small in terms of numbers of species.

We tend to are most acquainted with one family of bees, Apidae, which includes honey bees and bumblebees. Honey bees, after all, turn out honey; these are social bees that live in colonies of 50,000 to 60,000 workers, 300 drones, and usually a single queen. Honey bee colonies are terribly complex in terms of behavior and overall perform; these bees behave for the survival of the colony, and not for individual survival. There are 10 broad types of honey bee worldwide, and one hybrid selection, the Africanized bee, or “killer bee.” The European honey bee is most commonly kept by beekeepers, for the aim of harvesting honey and bee byproducts.

Bumblebees are also from the family Apidae, however bumblebee colonies are abundant smaller than those of honey bees, typically hosting solely some hundred employee bees. Like honey bees, bumblebees are wonderful pollinators of various flowers; their bodies are quite furry, trapping pollen simply as the bees move from flower to flower to eat. And bumblebees do after all build honey, similar in texture and style to honey from honey bees however greenish-golden in tint rather than the pure golden color of standard honey. Bumblebees build comparatively small quantities of honey — their colonies are therefore tiny — and it’s troublesome to harvest, thus bumblebee honey is sometimes not found on the market.

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There are nonetheless a lot of members of the Apidae family, solitary rather than colonizing. Digger bees usually build their nests within the soil, rearing their young in soil tunnels; their bodies are bushy, and sometimes up to three centimeters long. Digger bees often nest in shut proximity to every other, giving the looks of a colony, however every female is acting independently, protecting and collecting pollen for her young. These bees are nonaggressive and will not sting unless they’re trapped in clothing. Carpenter bees, on the other hand, nest in previous wood; like digger bees, they are solitary, but usually nest in shut proximity to each other.

Leafcutter bees and mason bees are members of the Megachilidae family; they are solitary, with leafcutters creating nests in hollow plant stems and prepared-created holes in wood and mason bees nesting in old mortar and numerous crevices. With solitary bees, it is the female that mates and rears her young on her own; as with social bees, the males serve no purpose alternative than to mate with fertile females. Many of these solitary bees are increasingly being reared commercially for pollination purposes, particularly as honey bee populations around the world are dwindling for as nonetheless unexplained reasons.

Mining bees belong to the Andrenidae family; this family contains thousands of species around the world. Also solitary, mining bees excavate tunnels and cells underground in that to rear their young; their tunnels are typically visible as small mounds in the ground, resembling worm casts. A nest might consist of a main tunnel with five or six branches each containing an egg cell. Mining bees like sandy soil. They do not cause any injury to a garden, and should be welcomed as effective pollinators.

Bees of the Halictidae family are typically referred to as “sweat bees” as a result of they’re attracted by perspiration; females can give a minor sting if trapped. These bees nest in the bottom or in wood, and they are social, though their caste system differs from that of honey bees or bumblebees. And therefore the Colletidae family contains plasterer bees, therefore known as as a result of they sleek the walls of their nest cells with secretions that dry into a lining resembling cellophane. These are solitary bees, found largely in Australia and South America.

Four other bee families — Melittidae, Meganomiidae, Dasypodaidae, and Stenotritidae — are very little in variety of species; these rare bees are found in Africa or Australia.

Bees are abundant additional diverse in sort and behavior than would at initial appear. You’re presumably to encounter honey bees and bumblebees, but most all bees are effective pollinators, and as such a valuable link in our global ecosystem.
Robert Mccormack has been writing articles online for nearly 2 years now. Not only does this author specialize in Bee-Pollen-Health, Different Types of Bees. You can also check out his latest website about: Bee-Pollen-Health Different Types of Bees
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Bed Bugs are heat sensitive, wingless blood-feasting bugs that are found everywhere, including the United States. Initially they start life like a small but visible egg, about the dimension of a poppy seed. From there they feed on blood and become juvenile or “nymph” stage bugs. As they develop into adults, brown or red (fed) bed bugs (Here you can get data about what is bed bug) get about the dimensions of an apple seed. Bed bugs can live up to 20 months and might go without a blood meal for 1 ½ years. The female bed bug can lay over 500 eggs in her life cycle, which hatch in about 10 days, given the best temperatures.

It is believed that bed bugs don’t transmit disease. However, they can cause an allergic skin response and bacterial infection from scratching.

If found on time, bed bugs can be effectively managed.

Bites are normally the first warning sign of a bed bug problem, but not all bug bites are bedbugs. Here you can get data about what is bed bug. Since 1998, Amherst School has had only one bed bug incident, which was confined to a single room. That isolated incident occurred, like most bed bug problems, because they were shifted to one site from another in personal belongings such as back packs, bedding, clothing and suitcases.

Bed Bug Bites

Bed bug bites, unlike bites which you might get from a gnat, mosquito, no-see-um or similar pest generally present with a number of attacks, normally in a directly row on the arms, legs, neck or torso. Bed bugs tend to gather together in hidden, undisturbed places where a person sits or sleeps.

* Bed bugs are typically found on the bed, along the seams and sides of the bed mattress and box springs, on the headboard, and the bed frame.

* When assessing a bed or furniture for the possibility of bed bugs, we find for clusters of live bugs, shedding skins, dark colored fecal spots and the eggs. We look for blood spotting on the bed linens, where the bed bugs bite the host * Bed bugs are also known to cover in cracks, such as in baseboards along the floor at the wall.

* Bed bugs are as well known to conceal in cracks, for example in baseboards along the floor on the wall.

Do you need to know more about what is bed bug.visit more information http://whatisbedbug.com
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Experts estimate the world is home to 22,000 ant species. Two of them, the notorious, pharaoh ants and fire ants are major problems throughout the world in hospitals, nursing homes and schools. They’re creating new headaches for public administrators and operations managers. Why all the fuss? Pharaoh ants and fire ants are more than a nuisance; they’re responsible for serious human illness and sometimes even death.

The pharaoh ant is one of the world’s premier ant pests. The tiny disease carrying pharaoh ant (1/16 of an inch in length) is difficult to see with a visual inspection. These tiny insects have a translucent, reddish gold color.  Although a tropical species, thanks to central heating they are now flourishing in colder climates.

Pharaoh ants live in multi-colonies with thousands or hundreds of thousands of members. They establish huge colonies throughout hospitals, nursing homes, schools and other settings. Pharaoh ants have even penetrated the security of recombinant DNA laboratories (source: Haack and Granovsky). The warmth seeking pharaoh ants build nests around central heating pipes and boiler rooms. They also live in warm, moist inaccessible areas such as inside furniture, behind baseboards and under floors. Pharaoh ants may even find homes between layers of bed linens and in piles of trash and inside appliances. Once they invade a building they’re just about impossible to eliminate.

These insects have a wide food preference ranging from fruits to syrups, meats, fatty foods, oily foods and dead insects. In hospitals, nursing homes and schools, these pests easily carry germs from one area to another. Pharaoh ants are known to spread diseases, some life threatening, especially to the sick and elderly. 

Researchers have analyzed pharaoh ants found in hospitals – they discovered over a dozen types of pathogenic bacteria. According to The Lancet, one of the world’s prestigious medical journals, pharaoh ants captured in nine hospitals were found to be carriers of Pseudomonas, Salmonella spp., Streptococcus spp., Staphylococcus spp., and Clostridium spp.

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In severely infested environments, pharaoh ants brazenly crawl into human wounds and dine on blood plasma and wound dressings. These ants can spread bacteria and disease while traveling from patient to patient. Newborns and burn victims residing in pharaoh ant-infested hospitals are subjected to increased risk due to the pharaoh ants’ pathogens. In hospitals, they have been observed searching for moisture from the mouths of sleeping babies and from active IV bottles.

It is best to ask an expert to deal with these unwanted guests. If you disturb a colony they split the colony through a process called budding and will create several new nests in adjacent areas. To help prevent infestations in hospitals, nursing homes and schools, keep food in sealed, secure containers and keep areas free of food particles and sweet liquids.  These insects contaminate food with the pathogens they’ve picked up while crawling in buildings.

Red imported fire antswere accidently brought to the United States from South America in the early 1900′s. These ants are aggressive, efficient competitors. They live in large colonies in dirt nests, which form mounds. They eat plants and occasionally smaller insects. Their bites create a burning sensation and painful pustules in about 50 percent of people bitten. Infected pustules can turn into scars.

Fire ants inject their venom by utilizing the biting parts of their jaw and rotating their bodies. They often inject venom into a victim numerous times. People allergic to fire ant venom may experience anaphylaxis; a life-threatening allergic reaction. 

People are more likely to be attacked while outdoors, however there have been reports of fire ants stinging people in nursing homes, hotels and homes. Fire ant stings have actually killed a small number of nursing home patients (source: The American Journal of Medicine).  

In severely fire ant infested hospitals and nursing homes, cognitively impaired, immobile patients are particularly at risk of a fire ant attacks. An attack may cause respiratory tract obstruction, frank anaphylaxis and the worsening of pre-existing conditions. In Florida, in 2000, Mary L. Morales Gay, an elderly nursing home patient with Alzheimer’s disease, died a day after being bitten 1,625 times by fire ants (source: Associated Press). Why was she bitten that many times? Vibration or movement inspires a group of fire ants to bite. It’s natural for people move when fire ants swarm on their arms or legs.

Fire ant attacks have inspired lawsuits against doctors and health care facilities (source: The American Journal of Medicine). In 2005, Earl Dean Griffith, while recuperating from surgery in a Florida nursing home, died after being bitten by hundreds of fire ants. The 73 year old Griffith died from a combination of shock and ant poison in his system. Mariner Health Care, one of the nation’s largest nursing home chains, agreed to pay his family members $1.8 million. As you can see, fire ant infestations are not just a problem for third world countries, but can be an issue for healthcare facilities and nursing homes in the United States. 

Ants of all varieties crawl through their own waste material, animal feces and other waste material as they move around their environment and nest. Their body can pick up and deposit bacteria and other microorganisms throughout hospitals, nursing homes, schools, homes etc. School cafeterias should be extra careful; as these specific pest ants transmit food-borne illnesses such as dysentery and Salmonella on food and food preparation surfaces. Safety measures and proactive professional ant control services may prevent diseases and lawsuits. 

Due to the adaptive nature of ant colonies, destroying the entire colony is nearly impossible. Typically pest management companies will strive to control local ant populations. Hospitals, nursing homes and schools should eliminate food particle and sweet liquid messes quickly. Your facility may not currently have disease carrying ants but they are spreading around the United States. It is best to implement a comprehensive ant prevention program with the help of a professional pest management firm to avoid human illness and lawsuits from ant infestations.

Jesse Eaton is a member of the pest professional team at ChemTec Pest Control. This New Jersey based pest control firm serves commercial and residential clients. ChemTec Pest Control is located at 186 Saddle River Road, Saddle Brook, NJ. You can reach the ant experts at ChemTec Pest Control at (201) 843-0780 or by email at wecare@chemtecpest.com. Please visit us on the Web at www.chemtecpest.com (http://www.chemtecpest.com).
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At some point every pet owner will experience the misery of fleas. Depending on where you live fleas can be a seasonal nuisance or a year around headache. In either case, a flea infestation can become a nightmare reminiscent of a Hollywood horror movie complete with unstoppable blood sucking parasites.

In any battle it is important to understand your foe, so let’s touch on a few flea facts. These insects are very small with a hard shell.  They are capable of jumping amazing distances for their size, four to five feet horizontally and close to a foot straight up.  Fleas operate on three basic imperatives, survival, feeding, and reproducing and they are experts at all of them. Fleabites can be incredibly itchy because when they bite they inject blood-thinning compounds to keep the blood from clotting as they feed. As well as causing itching these anti clotting proteins can cause a massive immune system reaction. Flea allergic dermatitis is one of the most common skin problems in pets. For both pets and people allergic to fleabites one bite can cause a severe and prolonged reaction. To make matters worse fleas can also transmit many diseases such as Bubonic Plague, Lyme disease, Rocky Mountain spotted fever and tapeworms.

It is very important to understand that your war against fleas must be fought on three fronts. They are; the pet, the home, and the outdoor environment. For every flea you see on your pet there can be up to 100 more in the surrounding environment in various stages of development. Typically an adult female flea lays about 20 eggs at a time. Depending on the conditions she can live up to a year and a half producing thousands of eggs. These eggs are normally laid in dark damp places and if they are laid on the pet they will fall off but not before they have traveled all over the home and the yard. These eggs will hatch in about a week most of the time, however, they can delay hatching until conditions are right for them. Once the eggs are hatched the larvae pupate, spinning cocoons in which they finish their development, typically another week. As with the egg stage of development these larvae can survive in the cocoon for up to six months waiting for the ideal conditions to emerge. It is easy to see now why we must address not only the fleas on our pets but the surrounding area as well.

Obviously, prevention is the best method of flea control. However, even the most proactive flea prevention regime is not guaranteed 100% to keep fleas from your pet. Once fleas have found your pet they must be eradicated quickly to prevent a full-blown infestation. There are many products available for repelling and killing fleas; there is also considerable debate as to the safety of some of these products.

Several types of topical sprays and shampoos effectively kill and repel fleas. Unfortunately many of them contain chemicals and pesticides that can be highly toxic. Felines are especially susceptible to these types of products because of their grooming habits, which leads to them ingesting whatever is on their fur.

The effectiveness of flea collars is very limited at best and these types of collars are often treated with chemical pesticides that you really do not want your pet wearing around their neck all of the time. There are natural flea collars that are effective in areas where fleas are not a severe problem but are not a good choice for a first line of defense.

The debate surrounding “Spot On” flea products is ongoing and at times can be quite heated. Chemical spot-on flea products contain powerful pesticides and should be considered only as a last resort for pets with extremely severe flea allergies. It goes without saying that any type of pesticide poses a health risk to humans and animals alike. Both over-the-counter and veterinarian prescribed topical treatments contain pesticides. These pesticides enter our pet’s internal organs, livers and kidneys; move into the intestinal tracts and, over time, are eliminated in their feces and urine. These chemicals are easily transferred to human skin when the animal is petted or handled. This fact should be of particular concern to pet owners with children. In spite of claims of the safety of these products by the manufacturers and many veterinarians chemical spot-ons have been known to cause severe adverse reactions such as excessive salivation, lethargy, skin rashes, tremors, hyperactivity, seizures and even death.  In 2008 the Environmental Protection Agency received more than 44,000 reports of adverse reactions to these products and is currently investigating the safety of all registered spot on products.

If you have health and safety concerns about using these products there is good news. We often forget that nature is all about balance. While nature has provided fleas with amazing survival skills it has also provided a way to defeat their defenses. Diatomaceous earth or “DE” is a simple but effective natural substance that will eliminate fleas.

Diatomaceous earth is a mineral substance that consists of the fossilized remains of prehistoric diatoms or algae. It is a powder and is very fine and smooth to the touch. While it is non-toxic to people and pets it is deadly for pests such as fleas and ticks. This is because on a microscopic level it is razor sharp and as the powder covers the flea or tick it cuts the shells, this leads to dehydration and death for the pests. DE is effective for killing fleas in all life stages.

Diatomaceous earth has several advantages over the chemical forms of flea control. It is mechanical in its killing action rather than chemical. This means that the pests cannot build immunity or adapt to it and thereby preventing the creation of a pesticide resistant super flea, which can prove to be very difficult to kill. It won’t pollute your home or the environment or water supply with residual chemicals, which can linger for years and pose a substantial health risk to both your pets and your family. DE is an all purpose flea killer and can be used anywhere fleas hide and live thereby replacing the need for separate products for your pet, your home and your yard. DE can be used in your pets fur, on their bedding, in carpets and furniture and even in the yard making it powerfully effective since fleas spend the majority of their reproduction and growth stages in the surrounding environment and not on your pet. DE will penetrate the smallest of spaces or tightest of carpet and fabric weaves killing the fleas where they are most vulnerable and disrupting the reproductive cycles.

While results with Diatomaceous earth are not as immediate as those with pesticide laden products you should see noticeable results within two to three days and can realistically expect your pet and home to be completely free of fleas within two weeks. All of this with no toxic chemicals, no horrible smelling flea products, no oily or sticky residues and no unnatural substances, who could ask for more?

Although DE is a natural product there are still some things to keep in mind if you choose to use it as a form of flea control.  First of all you can find products with DE created specifically as a flea powder, however you can also simply purchase DE in small or bulk quantities. If you decide to simply purchase the DE make certain it is a food grade DE, not the product for pool filters that most people are familiar with. Food grade diatomaceous earth is a more highly refined and cleaner product than that which is used as for swimming pool filtration. Second, DE is extremely fine and a little goes a long way, using too much can lead to dry skin for your pet. The products designed specifically as a flea powder will have very specific directions of how much and how often to use the product to avoid this problem. With food grade DE it is recommended to apply it twice a week but no more than three times in a week. Keep an eye on your pets skin, if it seems to be dry use less of the powder or reduce the number of applications you are applying. Finally when using the DE apply it lightly and slowly to keep the dust down so that neither you or your pet are breathing in the product then using a comb or brush gently work it into the fur.

Diatomaceous earth has many other uses besides pest control. It is an incredibly versatile substance and thousands of pet owners have used this completely natural way to control fleas and ticks with great success.  By choosing DE you will be joining a growing number of eco-conscious, health-motivated pet lovers who want safe and effective flea control

Jeffrey Weber has been a long time and avid pet lover. Over the years he has had the privilege to learn from pet professionals, as well as from his own experience, many things that enhance the joys of having a pet. In an effort to help strengthen the bond between people and their pets he openly shares his knowledge on his blog “Family Pets”In addition Jeff and his wife believe a healthy pet is a happy pet and offer highest quality pet supplies at Your-Pets-R-Family-2
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