The Ongoing Pest Cycle
If you have spent an entire year in the Bryan or College Station area, then you are probably familiar with the Pest Cycle. There are pest issues that crop up every month and from month to month the pests change. That change is what we call the pest cycle. There are the spring pests, summer pests, seasonal pests, migratory pests, warm weather pests, cold weather pests, pests that are associated with water and pests that are down right dangerous.
Seasonal Pests
Pick a season and there is a long list of pests associated with that season. For example, summer is the time for mosquitoes, wasps, snakes, spiders, raccoon and possum, skunks, scorpions, bats, birds, and so on down the list. The changes from one week to the next can bring new pests or begin a new cycle. Ants, mice, rats, grasshoppers, crickets, etc.
Being able to keep track of what is the current pests and what should be emerging is a big job. It is also not an easy job because there are many factors that impact when a pest becomes active. A cooler summer might cause pest cycles to overlap or cause the emergence of a new pest at a time when that pest should not be present. Biting flies are a good example of this. They tend to emerge in June but if the summer is mild, they might mate more often and have more time to produce more generations before they die. The same is true of a mild winter which tends to extend the insect cycles and increase the rodent populations.
Crop Pests – Sometimes what is planted in the surrounding ag lands can cause pest issues for businesses and home owners. Because crops change, so do the pests associated with those crops. After a crop is harvested is also a time of concern because the pests that had fed on that crop are now looking for new food sources.
Weather Related Pests
Beyond temperature, which has its own cycle, weather is a big factor for many pests. A rainy spring might delay the emergency of pests, where as a rainy summer might increase the populations of mosquitoes and other water-related pests. Wet weather tends to also bring in many pests, such as cockroach, mice, and spiders who are all looking for a dry place to wait out the storms. Overly dry weather is a haven for those insects who love the heat and who feed on dying plants. Primarily, this is rodents and insects, such as grasshoppers.
The short of it is that the pest problem never really goes away because of the pest cycle. The ongoing emergency of pests based on factors like weather and seasonal changes means that businesses and property owners never have just a single pest control issue. For more information about our affordable monthly pest control inspections, give us a call. We are happy to answer your questions about specific pests or talk with you about how to manage pest control issues before they happen.
