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In the fight against bed bugs, pest management professionals face a tough adversary. Treating infestations not only demands effort but also quick-acting solutions that can provide lasting results, ensuring callbacks are kept to a minimum. Dusts can often be an overlooked part of a pest management professional’s toolbox, yet they play a key role in winning the battle. So, what makes dust such an important asset? Let’s dig in.
Speed
Dust itself works by abrading the cuticle that helps a bed bug hold in moisture, effectively causing them to dry out. Dusts will often include one or more active ingredients that attack the nervous system, thereby creating a powerful combination to provide quick knockdown control.
Temprid® Dust from Envu is one such option with two active ingredients, beta-cyfluthrin (pyrethroid) and flupyradifurone (butenolide),
As pest populations are on the rise, professionals are always looking to stop problems at the source by using effective solutions. One technique often used in these products is the transfer effect, a method that uses the pest’s natural behaviors against it.
The transfer effect, or secondary elimination, is used by simply exploiting the interaction the pest will have with others of its own species to amplify the control of the product throughout a population. The setup for this technique typically involves introducing a substance with something such as a bait to pests in an area.
Of course, this material is designed to eliminate any pests that come into contact with it. But before it does, the active ingredient stays on the body so the pest inadvertently spreads and carries the substance back to nests or colonies. Through various interactions, the product will spread among the pest population, causing a domino effect that disrupts and eliminates the pests in that area.
It doesn’t take much to make a comfortable home for mosquitos. All too often, PMPs face callbacks and customer complaints because they’ve overlooked a single area where mosquitos can happily breed, rest, and feed. Some hotspots are obvious. Others are more hidden. Follow the tips in this guide to check — and treat — the most common spots overlooked by PMPs.
By Chris Keefer, Ph.D., technical services manager for Syngenta
In some U.S. regions, peridomestic cockroach activity may be quelled by weather at certain times of the year, but German cockroaches tend to be a problem all year. Some key concepts to keep in mind for successfully controlling German cockroaches include conducting thorough inspections, understanding their cryptic behavior and reproductive potential, using an integrated pest management approach and rotating active ingredients with different modes of action.
Inspection
- Identify the requisites of life and/or conducive conditions of the target pest population
- If you can partially or completely remove these conditions, it will exponentially increase the success of insecticide treatments
- Using zone monitors or glue boards can be helpful, especially when dealing with a small infestation
- These devices can lead you directly to an infestation
- Identify the requisites of life and/or conducive conditions of the target pest population
When an account does not have recent signs of rodent activity, they may think about putting their rodent control service on hold. Customers don’t want to pay a service for something that no longer seems necessary, and having visible rodent control devices out at their business can be perceived negatively by the public. Having rodent control measures in place at accounts in high-traffic areas can be misleading to the average person, as uneducated viewers may assume there is a current rodent problem at hand. Weekly onsite visits where PMPs must manually service each station around the facility is very noticeable to the public as well. A rumor could arise and spread about a rodent infestation, which would damage a business’ reputation and revenue. Preventive rodent control is necessary to keep clients safe, and ideally services should be conducted as discreetly as possible.
Ideally, rodent control should be conducted using a preventive approach, rather than reactive. Catching
Cockroach infestations are one of the most difficult challenges you can face as a PMP. Their resilience and rapid reproduction can quickly turn a minor issue into a major crisis. A comprehensive cockroach protocol is critical for gaining long-term control over German cockroach populations.
Assessment-based Pest Management (APM): A Crucial Approach
Utilizing an APM strategy is critical for success. The cornerstone of APM is a thorough inspection and monitoring of the infested area. Categorizing infestations into high-, medium or low-levels allows for a customized treatment approach. Regular reassessment before follow-ups ensures the effectiveness of your treatment.
Inspection: During your inspection, focus on areas with high humidity/water, darkness, and limited air movement, including looking under sinks, refrigerators, dishwashers, and stoves, around toilets, near trash containers, and inside cabinets. Availability of water,
Understanding the Challenge
German cockroach infestations are a persistent challenge for Pest Management Professionals. German cockroaches mature fast, typically taking around 100 days to complete the entire life cycle. With a short life cycle and high reproductive capacity, they are resilient pests that can adapt quickly, leading to the development of resistance to both the active ingredient and food matrix in baits. Having a rotational plan in place is essential for successful treatments.
The Rotational Advantage
Rotating cockroach gel baits helps to combat resistance and enhance
By Tim Husen, Ph.D., technical services manager, Syngenta Professional Pest Management
Managing structural-infesting nuisance ants is a multi-step process. Ants have complex and diverse nesting biology and foraging behaviors, so identifying the type of ant you are dealing with should always be the first step in any ant service treatment. Pest
Developing an effective line of animal repellents begins with understanding how animal behavior engages their ecological environment. Over many years, EPIC Repellents has developed proprietary theory that defines animal behavior, points to combinations of all-natural ingredients that deter animals and predicts the impact EPIC repellent formulas have upon the animals, people, and the environments in which they live.
After visiting dead animals, feces, raw garbage, dumpsters, grease-traps, sewers, floor drains, biofilms, House flies, aka: “flying infections,” enter sensitive facilities and contaminate foods and surfaces through a combined process of extraoral digestive fluids (cyclical regurgitation), defecation, and groom-shedding of bodily particles. House flies contaminate everything from farm to fork and ultimately foods consumed by customers. As a result, filth flies convert restaurants into “pestaurants.” The risks are more intense in the healthcare environment if we see a flying insect in a surgical suite or in pharmaceutical production if there’s contamination caused by flies in sterile environments.
Insect light traps (ILT) exploit the House fly’s neurological mechanism of positive phototactic behavior. Research fact, House flies are most attracted to a wavelength (365 nm) or color of light (UVA).
Many fluorescent lamp ILTs monitor and