Nobody wants an infestation of spiders, ants, mice or other pests in their home. However, some of your bad habits may be luring these unwelcome visitors into your home. Here are five bad habits that attract pests.
1. Leaving Dog Food Out Overnight
Leaving your dog’s food bowl out overnight makes it easy for them to get a midnight snack, but it also provides a convenient food source for pests. Food that’s left out overnight on the floor is very easy for bugs to access, and you may discover that your habit has attracted ants, cockroaches or other unwelcome visitors to your kitchen.
To avoid luring pests into your kitchen, feed your dog during designated meal times. After your dog is done eating, wash and store their food bowl.
2. Leaving Dishes in the Sink
The mountain of wet, dirty dishes may not look very appealing to you, but it’s very inviting to pests like cockroaches. The easy access to water and food is appealing to cockroaches, and when one cockroach finds your messy sink, they’ll use theirforaging pheromones to tell all their friends about the delicious buffet.
To keep your sink from becoming the neighborhood cockroaches’ favorite restaurant, avoid leaving wet, dirty dishes in your sink. Wash your dishes after each meal, then dry them and put them away in your cupboards.
3. Not Cleaning Up Clutter
A recent survey found that 21% of Americans describe their home as somewhat cluttered, while another 6% think their home is very cluttered. If you have a clutter problem in your home, you may be attracting pests.
Clutter is attractive to pests for many reasons. It gives them a safe place to hide and breed, and the clutter can even provide a food source. Cardboard boxes, for example, are food for cockroaches, termites and other types of pests. To avoid attracting pests, prioritize de-cluttering your home.
4. Not Controlling Indoor Moisture
Some types of pests, like earwigs, centipedes and pill bugs, need to live in moist environments to avoid drying out. Outdoors, they find this moist environment in places like underneath rotting logs or in the soil, but if you’re not controlling moisture levels in your home, they may want to live inside your home, instead.
To control moisture levels, make sure that you don’t have any leaks in your pipes or any dripping faucets. You should also pay attention to your home’s humidity levels. Indoor humidity levels should fall somewhere between 30% and 50% to prevent pest problems. If your home is too humid, use exhaust fans in your bathrooms and kitchen, and if necessary, place dehumidifiers around your home to draw excess moisture out of the air.
5. Not Storing Dry Food Properly
It’s convenient to store your dry food, like your cereal, flour and sugar, in their original cardboard or paper packages. However, this also makes it very easy for pests to get into your food. Pests can chew through the cardboard or paper before you even open the packages, and once the package is open, it’s even easier for them to get to your food.
To protect your food and keep pests away, transfer your dry food into pest-proof packages as soon as you get home from the grocery store. If you’re only worried about insects, plastic containers with tight lids may be the right choice for you, but if you’re worried about mice, opt for metal or glass containers that rodents can’t chew through.
To keep pests like insects and rodents from infesting your home, it’s important to break the bad habits that attract pests.