Southland Heat Wave Brings With It Ants, Spiders
BURBANK (CBSLA) — If you've noticed more pests around your home lately, you're not alone.
"We have a lot of spiders, a good amount of ants," Ricardo Eichwald, a Burbank resident, said. "Where it gets warm on this side of my house, on the south side, I get a lot of ants come in through the door and then they make their way to my pantry."
Chris Ultimo and Michelle McKinley, also of Burbank, said they have noticed spiders, crickets and other bugs that make sounds throughout the day and night.
"It's the heat and the humidity that causes their eggs to hatch and reproduce," Kevin Mills, owner of Mills Pest Management, said. "What we've been seeing lately is ant swarmers, we've been getting a lot of calls the last week with the heat wave coming in, and they're seeing flying ants, or winged ants, inside their homes."
Mills said his company tends to get twice as many calls for service in the summertime.
"Ants, especially termites, spiders, most crawling insects just are out of control this time of year, all the way through until probably the end of October," he said.
Experts said part of pest control is spraying a treatment around the foundation of the home and along plumbing access and electrical lines, anywhere pests can enter the home. But, they said, spiders are a little more challenging.
"You almost really have to spray the spider directly in order to achieve control," Mills said.
As for Eichwald, he said spiders tend to stay in the bushes around his home.
"So I have to be on top of it, because somebody can walk into a spider web or whatever back there," he said. "So I constantly have somebody come out and spray."
And Ultimo and McKinley said they hired a pest control company once they saw their 2-year-old daughter start pointing out bugs in their home.
Pest experts said ants, in particular, love sweets and protein and recommended keeping products like peanut butter and meat products sealed up and out of the way. As for spiders, the only way to get rid of them is head on, the experts said.
