Tips For Making Your Home Less Attractive to Pests

Trying to make your home less attractive sounds like the opposite of what most people want to do. However, when your home becomes less attractive to pests, it will in turn become more attractive to humans. Cleaning up, repairing holes, and getting organized are just some simple signal to pests that your home is not a hospitable place for them to take up residence.

Read on to discover the best ways to make your home less attractive to pests.

Declutter Your Yard

You should start by not even inviting pests onto your property to begin with by cleaning up your yard. Pests, especially insects and rodents, are drawn to clutter. Boxes, old tires, and other items left outside are a nice, big ‘welcome’ sign for a herd of pests. Piles of leaves and overgrown bushes and trees are especially inviting.

Remove Standing Water

There is nothing worse than accidentally stepping in a sopping puddle in your lawn - especially if you’re already dressed for the day. Clearing standing water from your lawn, using gutters to send water away from the foundation and getting rid of areas that seem to always stay moist, will not only improve the appearance and functionality or your yard, but will also keep bugs (especially mosquitoes) away from your property.

Seal Cracks, Gaps, and Holes

Seal any foundation cracks, no matter how small. Termites can enter a space as small as 1/32 of an inch. Repair cracked stucco or crumbling mortar, and seal wall openings around vents and pipes. Repair any tears or holes in your screens, and weather strip windows and doors. If you have open porches, install quarter-inch mesh screening to keep animals out.

Clear Away Food From Outside

Pests need food, and if you leave it outside after a barbecue or party, they’ll gladly help themselves. In fact, they’ll invite their friends and relatives too. Clean up all food outside, and throw it away in sealed plastic bags.

Make sure you put the bags inside a closed outdoor trash can as well because bugs don’t just love to eat food, they also love to lay eggs in it. Last weekend’s hamburger could be an entire city of bugs in just a few days, and these bugs could eventually work their way into your home.

Clear Out Rotting Foods From Your Pantry

Keep your kitchen smelling nice for yourself, and give pests one less reason to enter your home. Pests have a nose for rotting food and will work hard to get to it. Make sure you stay on top of your food rotation so you don’t end up with bug-infested rotting food to clean up.

Clean Up the Grime

Cockroaches are fond of that yucky grime that settles around your oven and refrigerator. It also looks terrible. Keep the area clean, and cockroaches will have to find another house with appliance grime to invade.

Vacuum

Who doesn’t love a freshly-vacuumed room? Pests, that’s who. Enjoy the clean feeling a newly vacuumed room gives to your home, and remove the crumbs and tiny bits of food source the pests were hoping to find.

Wipe Your Counters

If you leave sticky messes, leftover food, and crumbs all over your counters, don’t be surprised when you find yourself sharing living quarters with insects. Keep your kitchen clean to not only enjoy good health, but discourage insects and rodents from finding lunch when you’re not looking.

Hire a Pest Control Company

Sometimes, despite your best efforts, insects and rodents still find a way into your home. If you already have an established pest problem, call a trusted pest control company to help take care of it. There are several reasons why you may want to leave pest control to the experts.