Spring is in the air! As soon as the weather starts getting warm enough to be outside comfortable, people start putting together home improvement project lists. A common spring project is cleaning out the house!
Many cities will even have designated City Wide Clean Up dates, so you may see items lining the curbs ready to get picked up by city workers or garbage trucks/refuse haulers.
But, another aspect of City Wide Clean Up, at least for me, is driving around or walking around and looking at everyone else’s things. It’s kind of like going to garage sales or thrift stores, except everything is, well, free, and on the curb!
While everything is permissible, not everything may be beneficial. It is fun to look around, but be cautioned: thoroughly inspect items for pests before you bring them home! You do not want to bring pests home with the items!
Check out our article Pest Roulette: The 9 Invasive Hitchhikers in Second-Hand Finds.
Second-hand stores, Facebook Marketplace, Craigslist, shipped items purchased online, and picking up items off of the curb are the most common ways pests, like cockroaches and bed bugs, spread.
Read all about our cautionary customer story on roaches in a Barbie Dreamhouse and learn of 5 tips to ensure a pest-free spring clean-up!
Table of Contents
- Our Client’s Story: My Barbie Dreamhouse Came with Roaches
- 5 Tips to Ensure a Pest-Free Spring Clean-Up
- Conclusion
Our Client’s Story: My Barbie Dreamhouse Came With Roaches
This was the case for one of our clients who found a Barbie Dreamhouse for her granddaughter on the side of the road. She stopped and found it to be fairly nice, the pieces where there, so she thought she would take it home.
A couple of weeks later she was horrified to find that some roaches had taken residence in her home and were multiplying quickly! We asked her if she knew where they had come from and she had no idea.
Our technician, Chrissy, treated her home and placed some monitoring devices in some other rooms to see if any roaches would get caught on them, and they did, right in the room with the Barbie Dreamhouse!
The photo above was NOT from our client with the Barbie Dreamhouse, rather, it came from an apartment complex. But these are what the monitoring devices we use look like.
After the follow-up service, we did one final check in near the end of this customer’s 3 month warranty, just to make sure there were no more roaches.
Thankfully, because this customer called in right when she first saw a couple of roaches, we were able to eradicate the roaches quickly and effectively. Large infestations aren’t always so quickly remedied. Still, we’ve never encountered a roach infestation we couldn’t eradicate!
5 Tips to Spring Clean-Up Success
But because pests can transfer from house to house during spring clean up, we thought we’d share some helpful tips to avoid bringing home pests.
Sound familiar? Skip the line and call now to talk to an expert: 651-342-9489.
Also, check out our article on 8 spring pests to watch out for.
5 tips to a spring clean up success
- Look for visible pests on an item before you put it in your car or home.
- Look for hidden pests in grooves and cracks and crevices of items before taking home.
- Leave the item in your driveway or garage before bringing it into the house
- Consider treating the item with either a natural or chemical pest control product. When treating an area with a repellent, if there are any hidden pests, they will flush out of hiding.
- Contact Done Right Pest Solutions for all of your pest control needs if you find anything!
Check out our 1x Cockroach Service with 1 price, at least 1 follow-up, and a 3 month warranty!
Really interested in cockroach control? Check out Pest Management Professional’s online magazine from 2018, all about cockroach control!
Conclusion
We hope you’ve found this blog post fun and informative. We hope you don’t have to deal with a situation like this, but if you do: we can make it easier on you.
Be cautious when bringing things into your home. Be cautious when hiring a pest control company into your home. Only hire the best! And quality is in our name!
Send us an email to start the conversation: donerightpestsolutions@gmail.com or call or text our office line at 651-342-9489.
Here when you need us,
Done Right Team
Did that situation sound familiar? We’d love to hear from you! Let us know your spring clean-up stories. Have you ever brought pests home like that? Let us know!
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