Armor Pest Control of Texas

Archive for the ‘What We Kill!’ Category

• Cicada         Order Homoptera        

  Appearance:

•         Adult cicadas are stocky insects with prominent eyes and semi-transparent wings which fold against the body. They are 1 – 1 5/8 inches in length. Brown-black or greenish. Sometimes yellow on thorax and mouthparts. The wings are a brownish green.
• Habitat:
•         Around treas and other natural habitat.
• Food:
•         Adults do not eat. Nymphs feeds on juices from roots
• Life Cycle:
•         Gradual metamorphosis. Cicadas, also known as ‘locusts’, appear as adults in May and June, and crawl up into host trees to mate. After mating, the female cicada uses a knife-like organ to slit or puncture twigs of woody plants. She then lays eggs in the slits. In about 6 weeks the eggs hatch and the nymphs drop to the ground. They then dig into the soil and begin feeding by sucking sap from the tree roots. After approximately 3 years, the nymphs come out of the ground. They crawl up tree trunks, posts, or other objects; shed their last exoskeleton and emerge as adult, winged cicada. These adults live about one month. During this time they mate, and each female lays from 400 to 600 eggs.
• General Information:
•         Cicadas make a high-pitched, shrill sound which announces there presence to other cicadas. Only the male can make this sound to attract the females. The noise is produced from vibrating membranes on the underside of the first abdominal segment. Females can damage ornamental trees and shrubs by puncturing limbs and twigs when preparing egg-laying sites. Branches often die after being weakened by cicada egg-laying.

• Centipede: Class Chilopoda
•  
  Appearance:
• Usually brownish, flattened, and elongate animals which have many body segments. One pair of legs is attached to most of these body segments (unlike millipedes which have 2 pairs of legs per body segment). Length can be between 1 and 6 inches long and can run very rapidly.

  Habitat:

• Usually live outdoors in damp areas such as under leaves, stones, boards, tree bark, or in mulch around outdoor plantings. When these centipede habitats are near a home’s foundation, centipedes will wander inside where they may be found at floor level almost anywhere.

  Food:

• Centipedes eat only insects (carnivorous) such as spiders and ants, which can be beneficial to have them around if they can be tolerated.
• Life Cycle:
• They develop by gradual metamorphosis, so immature have a similar appearance to adults, but are smaller. Eggs are laid in the damp places that they live in, as well as behind sheaving, shingling, mulch and floor covering of landscaped areas, rocks and beneath bark on firewood. All life stages can be observed running rapidly across floors or accidentally trapped in bathtubs, sinks, and lavatories.

  General Information:

• Accidentally injured, larger centipedes may bite, causing some pain and slight swelling. Actually, their ‘bites’ are not caused by their jaws or mouthparts, but by the front legs which are modified to look and function like jaws and contain venom glands. Smaller species are not large enough to penetrate human skin. Centipede bites are usually not serious, but an antiseptic should be used and a physician consulted when the skin is punctured.

• House Centipede          Class Chilopoda

  Appearance:

•         The body is 1 to 1-1/2 inch long, but its legs make it appear to seem much larger. The body is grayish-yellow with 3 dark stripes extending along the full length of the back. The legs are long in proportion to the body size, and they have alternate light and dark bands running around them.
• Habitat:
•         Unlike most other centipedes, this species generally lives its entire life inside a building. It will prefer to live in damp areas such as cellars, closets, bathrooms, attics (during the warm months) and unexcavated areas under the house.
• Food:
•         The house centipede forages at night for small insects and their larvae, and for spiders. From a control tool point of view, they can be beneficial in controlling other insects.
• Life Cycle:
•         They develop by gradual metamorphosis, so immature have a similar appearance to adults but are smaller. Eggs are laid in the damp places that they live in, as well as behind baseboards or beneath bark on firewood. All life stages can be observed running rapidly across floors or accidentally trapped in bathtubs, sinks, and lavatories.
• General Information:
•         Although this centipede can bite, its jaws are quite weak. There usually is not more than a slight swelling if a bite occurs.

• Boxelder Bugs         Order Hemiptera       

  Appearance:

•         Adults are about inch long. They are bright red or black with narrow reddish lines on the back.
• Habitat:
•         Primarily around woods, Trees and gardens. When in dry environments, the Boxelder Bug can be found invading any structure which will offer needed moisture. Brick walls, wall voids, decaying plant mater and mulch can often be inspected to find large numbers coexisting.
• Food:
•         Principally sucking juices from the boxelder tree, but are found on maples,
• and fallen leaves from fruit trees.
• Life Cycle:
•         Gradual metamorphoses, with piercing-sucking mouth parts. Eggs are hidden in bark crevices or left on leaves and sometimes on seed pods in spring. Nymphs appear in late spring or early summer and develop rapidly. Adult females overwinter. 1 or 2 generations a year
• General Information:
•         Although this insect does little damage to trees, it causes deformities and blemishes in fruit. They may stain curtains and other resting sites with fecal spots and produce a foul odor when crushed. In autumn, huge swarms of females can be seen near buildings, looking for a place to overwinter.

• Bed Bugs Order hemiptera Appearance:
• 1/5 inches long and 1/8 inches wide. Its reddish-brown colored body is greatly flattened and oval-shaped. After feeding, the bug’s body enlarges considerably, becoming longer and much less flattened.
• Habitat:
• Bed bugs general hide in cracks and crevices during normal daylight hours. Typical hiding places are in the folds and tufts of mattresses, coils of springs, cracks and hollow posts of bedsteads, and upholstery of chairs and sofas.
• Food:
• Blood of warm blooded animals.
• Life Cycle:
• Piercing-sucking mouth parts. The nymphs undergo a gradual metamorphosis through five instars before becoming adults. Bed bug eggs are elongated and usually attached to an available surface when laid. Eggs are not known to be placed directly upon the host’s body, but are typically found on surfaces nearby to where the host sleeps or nests. Nymphs must have a blood meal during each instar (growth stage) in order to develop to the next instar. Each female will lay about two eggs a day until she has laid approximately two hundred. At normal room temperatures these will hatch in 6 to 17 days, each producing small, almost colorless nymphs which have the general body appearance of the adult. Bed bugs will mate soon after becoming mature, so the time from egg hatch to egg laying will often be 4 to 9 weeks.
• General Information:
• Bed bugs are very hardy insects. They can survive prolonged periods without food or under adverse temperature conditions. In laboratory tests, bed bugs have been found to carry the causative agents for several diseases such as anthrax, plage, tularemia, yellow fever, relapsing fever, and typhus. However, there is little evidence that they carry these disease organisms under normal conditions, so they are not considered an important factor in disease transmission.
• Bed Bug Management:
• Bed Bugs are usually controlled using insecticide spray or dust applications. Bed linens are not treated, and mattresses are treated only at seams, folds, buttons, or tears, and should be completely dried and covered with clean linens before use. Very small quantities of material is all that is required. All areas which the eggs and adults are hiding must be covered in order to be effective. A thorough application is essential to achieve adequate control. Due to the eggs being protected from the initial treatment, it is highly recommended that a minimum of two to four monthly treatments be made before considering the infestation to be eradicated.

Ants are becoming a major problem all over the country. They can be difficult to control, but there are some things you should know about how ants’ behavior can lead to big headaches for you and your home:

• Entry: Ants can enter through even the tiniest cracks seeking sweet or greasy substances in the kitchen pantry or storeroom areas.
• Scent trails: Ants leave an invisible chemical trail known as pheromones for others to follow once they locate the food source.
• Nest locations: They can nest about anywhere in and around your house; in lawns, walls, stumps, even under foundations.
• Colony size: Can number from 300,000 to 500,000 and whole colonies can uproot and relocate quickly when threatened.
• Nature’s way of protecting the colony: With comparative freedom from natural enemies, a colony can live a relatively long lifetime. Worker ants may live seven years and the queen may live as long as 15 years.
• Do-it-yourself ineffectiveness: Most do-it-yourself approaches only kill the ants you see, whereas a truly effective treatment will penetrate and destroy their nest to prevent them from returning. Also, home remedies don’t account for the fact that different kinds of ant infestations require different treatments.