Maryland Pesticide Network

Fall is the time insects, such as crickets, and rodents look for a warm place to live.

Your job is to seal them out! This means you must make any needed repairs to your home to help keep them outside. These repairs will also save on heating and air conditioning costs for years to come.

Insects and spiders can get in your home if there are gaps of more than 1/16 inch. Mice and rats can enter holes more than a 1/4 inch. Pests usually enter bottom corners of doors.

Follow these tips for keeping these pests out of your home:-

• Install or repair door strips on all exterior doors. The rubber part of door strips degradeswith time, so replace it if it is worn
• Seal baseboards with caulk, especially in kitchens
• Plug holes with caulk or steelwool (use gloves!)
• Fix gaps and tears in window and door screens
• Put extra coarse steel wool in all holes larger than 1/4" to keep out mice and rats
• Caulk cracks around windows and doors
• In houses also:
  • Put rubber seals on the bottom of garage doors
  • Seal holes where pipes and wires enter the foundation and siding. Use expanding foam to seal up gaps between the foundation and the house structure to keep out crickets
  • Put in a chimney cap to keep animals from coming in through the chimney opening
  • Caulk cracks on edge of the roof

Please send your pest management questions to info@mdpestnet.org for the Bio Pestman.

Alan Cohen is a licensed commercial pest control applicator in Maryland and DC, and the president of Bio-Logical Pest Management, Inc. He also serves as the Integrated Pest management advisor to the Maryland Pesticide Network, and is a board member of Beyond Pesticides.

Click here to read Alan's Previous article about dealing with wasps.