JOIN USIt’s just after the holiday season and you have just about gotten over your New Year party hangover. Life is now getting back to normal and each day, when you draw back those curtains in the morning you are greeted by the sight of just how messy your home is. Post new year is generally the time every one indulges in a bit of spring cleaning.
And among the things that need particular attention are bugs and pests that conveniently made your home theirs over the winter and this festive season.
Thanks to the onslaught of chain messages, forwards and the like on email and social media networks, it’s common knowledge that pesticides of any kind can have all sorts of repercussions on the health of the family. Not only that, any four-legged friendly pets you have in the house can end up ingesting pesticides leading to quite a painful time. The simple solution then would be to go the natural way.
Cleaning up to flush out pests
Keep in mind that when you are cleaning your home, getting rid of the clutter is most important. It’s a new year, so throw all those old newspapers away and do the same with the magazines. With all this junk out of the way, you can be sure that the hiding place of any bugs and cockroaches is effectively eliminated.
Once you are done with the cleaning, take a good look at your floor and windows and any other point of ventilation. Look for cracks in the foundation, around the woodwork and in the walls. Use a sealant to close all the little holes. This way you reduce the breeding ground available for any insects.
Especially with the bathroom, kitchen and the utility areas you have, make sure that you scrub them clean, disinfect them and ensure that the dampness goes away as soon as possible. This will prevent any breeding grounds developing for mosquitoes and bacteria.
Such clean-ups are also necessary for the surroundings of your home. Make sure that there are no points where water stagnates around the house giving rise to mosquitoes.
If you happen to have a water body as part of your landscaping, introduce a few fish into it as they will eat up the mosquitoes in the surroundings.
Your kitchen can be a major source of entertainment and food for bugs and you need to take control of the situation. Begin with all your cereals and grains. Ensure that they are stored in air-tight containers. Especially if you are walking into the winters, make sure you have no food left outside or uncovered. With severe drops in temperatures, bugs tend to turn indoors to forage for food and it does not matter to them whether they get toothpaste or water, they will go for it. When you see a trail of insects, try to get to their main source and eliminate them from there.
Bugging the bugs
Ants can be an eternal problem in any household. You will find them in the most unlikely of places like inside your microwave, around your water jug and even hovering around your toothbrush. If you have an ant infestation one simple way to tell them to buzz off is to peel cucumbers and place the peels around where you see them. The bitterness of the peel is what repels them. A cucumber peel will help you deal with wasps, flies and moths as well.
Crawling insects are another menace in every household. A simple recipe to keep them at bay would be to take a bit of garlic, some chilli, powdered charcoal, talcum powder and grind it all together. Use this paste to ward off a host of critters. What you have to remember that is each one of these ingredients work on different levels for different kinds of pests and you will have to do a bit of trial and error to see which one works well for you.
Once you find the main lair of these critters, squeezing some lemon juice down the hole will get rid of them for a while. Mixing together baking soda and some powdered sugar will put an end to cockroaches.
Place this paste where you see cockroaches and you will see them no more. You can use boric acid too which occurs naturally to help you deal with roaches. Keeping your home pest-free takes a bit of effort. Doing it with natural ingredients will also ensure that your little ones and your pets remain safe too.