• They feed on a wide range of food, including feces and human mucus
• Cockroaches transmit food poisoning, and contaminate food
• Cockroaches are carriers for dangerous diseases such as dysentery, diphtheria, typhoid, hepatitis, food poisoning and gastroenteritis.
• Their feces, moulted skins contain allergens, able to cause asthma and allergies in more sensitive human beings.

To cope with these threats consider the following five point plan to make sure that cockroaches don’t thrive in your home. There are things that will make a cockroach’s life difficult; most measures include the elimination of food, water and hiding places. Indian summer has started and in the last years we have seen cockroach infestation peaks in the hot season. Especially in Bangalore, after the somewhat cool winter, we started seeing more cockroaches with the rising temperatues.

1. Keep your kitchen clean. Try to maintain a proper sanitation for the whole kitchen. Promptly remove and crumbs and spills. A small crumb of food might actually be enough food for a few cockroaches for a few days. Fix dripping water taps and leakages Cockroaches require water to thrive and are attracted to water.
2. Restrict their access to food. Store food in sealed containers and do not leave any food out for extended periods. Do not leave dirty dishes overnight, as cockroaches will have a feast on what you leave them. Empty the garbage bin regularly, and store garbage outside the home.
3. Prevent cockroaches from hitchhiking into your home. Carefully inspect incoming LPG gas cylinders, as cockroaches often hide their egg cases in the handles and near the bottom of these bottles. Inspect the bags for cockroaches when bringing groceries home. Carefully examine second hand furniture and dispose of packaging materials fast.
4. Deprive them of breeding places. Do not accumulate clutter. Cockroaches will nest in anything from paper to clothing. Especially cardboard is a favorite breeding ground for them.
5. Seal all cracks and crevices inside your house. Like this you eliminate their preferred breeding and hiding places and their entry to the house. Fill every crack inside every cabinet; fill the cracks on both sides of floor, door, and window moldings; fill all openings around pipes in bathrooms and kitchens. A minimum number of hiding places will reduce the numbers of cockroaches in your home. Prevent cockroaches from coming up the drain. Put fine netting over the water drains in the kitchen and bathrooms. And regularly pour boiling water in these drains.

Do not postpone activities to get rid of cockroaches. Cockroaches are prolific breeders and the longer you wait the higher the risk of a major infestation that will be difficult to control. An egg capsule can produce up to 42 cockroaches. Given ideal conditions, a pair of cockroaches may be able to give rise to as many as 20,000 offspring in one year. That is, in a laboratory with loads of food. But even a fraction of those inside your home will be a lot.

How To Get Rid Of Cockroaches is a post from: deBugged - The Rentokil Blog

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1. Use environment-friendly and human-safe pesticides and repellants. It is cheaper mid to long-term and above all safer for everybody involved. I have seen recently some street vendors in Bangalore and Chennai selling various powders, which they claimed would kill any pest, for a very minimal fee. They could not tell me what chemicals it contains and hence I wouldn’t suggest trying it out at home, as the risks for health and environment might be quite high. There are certain home-made repellants, as long as they are on a herbal basis and include spices herbs or other harmless stuff, I think they are worth a try.  In case they should not work, well at least the house will smell nice (if you use cinammon, bay leaves, cloves, etc.)

2. Guidelines for general Pest Prevention

Sanitation and Exclusion are the keywords when it comes to prevent pest issues, even before they arise.

• Keep the area clean: Clean all spills right away. Consistently mop floors and wipe down countertops and tables.
• Isolate garbage: Use tight-fitting lids on waste receptacles. Throw out garbage promptly. Wash your garbage cans every day.
• Seal entry points: Make sure all windows and doors are tightly sealed. Do not leave open unscreened windows or doors. Cover vents and drains with screens.
• Inspect new supplies: Check all incoming goods for signs of pest infestation, such as cockroaches, meal moths and others. Cockroach egg cases are commonly found in the rim of LPG cylinders. Immediately dispose of anything suspect.

Guidelines for specific pest control

3. Ants

Prevention

Keep your building clean and seal cracks and crevices. Home remedies to repel ants to some extent are the following: Cinnamon, cayenne pepper, black pepper, vinegar, chalk, talcum powder and bay leaves.

4. Flies

Prevention

Flies need damp, decaying or fermenting organic material to breed. The best way to keep flies away is to consistently clean breeding areas. Probable breeding areas include garbage cans, moist mops, sides of drains and drain traps. A home remedy to clean drains safely is done by using pure vinegar, followed by baking soda and boiling water.

Control

Other than keeping breeding areas clean or professional pest control services, there are several monitoring devices to reduce fruit fly numbers, for example the following traps.

• Bottle traps: Cut holes five inches from the bottom of a two liter bottle. Fill with bait like wine, beer or a solution of vinegar, water and honey. Suspend from ceiling to trap and drown flies.
• Ultraviolet fly traps: Decorative ultraviolet fly traps are available. Some zap bugs and some trap them. Never use zappers indoors, or you might find pieces of fly in your food, because the zappers let insects explode on the electric grids.

5. Cockroaches

Prevention

To prevent cockroaches from invading your kitchen, eliminate their access to food and damp, dark areas. Clean consistently. Seal garbage in plastic bags or containers and put wet rags and sponges in airtight containers overnight. Hang mops up to dry. Fix leaky faucets and drains. Plumbing is like a cockroach’s highway system, so cover vents and floor and sink drains with screens.

6. Rodents

Prevention

A full-grown rodent can pass through a hole as small as a dime. Get possible entry points sealed to prevent mice from entering. Keep the perimeters of your establishment clean and the grass well-cut to discourage mice from hiding around your building and looking for a way in. Store garbage in locked containers.

Control

If you have mice in your establishment, deal with them immediately, The best thing to do is to call a pest control expert, with experience in dealing with rodent infestations. Traps are effective, but many codes ban them from food service establishments. Traps also take several days to work because rodents are wary of new additions to their environment. If you want to do it yourself (for reasons of revenge, hahaha), try one of the following traps:

• Live traps: Also known as “Have-a-Heart Traps,” live traps capture the mice in a metal mesh cage. Make sure you release the mouse far away from your building. Find and seal the mouse’s point of entry.
• Snap traps and glue traps: Many consider these traps to be inhumane. Check your local codes, because often glue traps are banned from restaurants and other food service establishments. If you must, use a flat board glue trap or a snap trap with a sensitive, expanded trigger. Position the traps against wall at a 90º angle.

All in all, there is a lot everybody of us can do to prevent his home from becoming a favorite spot for pests. Should infestation go out of hand, I would always suggest you to consider the help of an expert.

Hope that helps and I am wishing you all a summer that does not get too hot.

Home remedies for common pests? is a post from: deBugged - The Rentokil Blog

Apart from being irritating, many pests pose great threats as they transmit large number of diseases. Cockroach allergens as an example are a main source for asthma in children. Rats have week bladders and urinate freely, even when feeding. Their urine however often contains the pathogens for the Weil’s disease, outbreaks of which are especially common during monsoons.

The number one rule to remember when dealing with pests is that prevention is always better than cure. Pests usually come into the house for food, water and shelter, which form the survival triangle for any pests. Pest control experts advice to cut off any one element of the survival triangle to keep your house free of pests. Food sources can be the garbage disposal areas, or unwashed dishes kept overnight. Even few bread crumbs left over on the table can be a party for the cockroaches.

It is important to keep a very high sanitation level in our house. If you make it a habit to follow a few simple routines and guidelines, you can easily keep your house a pest free place. The following are important points to keep the pests at bay:

• Make sure that the area is always kept clean of food residues by sweeping, and wiping.
• Make sure that there are no spilled food items and that all dishes are immediately cleaned after eating.
• Remove the garbage regularly – otherwise you might be feeding the pests.
• Seal cracks & crevices. The pests love resting in these places
• Make sure your house is always kept dry.
• Be aware that pests are harmful for your health. Spread the awareness.
• If you spray and try to eliminate the pests you see, you are just addressing the tip of the iceberg. Unless you attack the colony or the nest, the pests will be back in no time.
• Seek professional help early before the pest infestations go out of control.

Paying attention to these simple precautions will help you in keeping your home pest free.

Don’t share your home with pests this summer is a post from: deBugged - The Rentokil Blog

Most of us do not like cockroaches, because they send shivers down our spines with their creepy appearance. But there is a lot more to cockroaches which is really worrying. Due to their close association with filth, they breed for example in drains and also feed on feces. Cockroaches are transmitters of numerous diseases: They transmit Dysentery, Typhoid and Hepatitis and, when walking over our food, leave a trail of bacteria, the most prominent being salmonella food poisoning.  On top of that they also have very powerful allergens which make them a main source for allergies and asthma.

So how can we find out whether there are roaches in the house and how do we get rid of them?

One very good way to find out if there are cockroaches in the house is called the Vegas roach trap. It is a home-made monitoring device, perfectly suited for households. It is very easy to make: All you need is a glass, such as pickle or gherkin glasses and a sock. Pull the sock over the glass and fill it with a little bit of water and coffee smudge. The best is the leftover smudge after making filter coffee from ground coffee. In case this is not available, a bit of toasted bread and beer will also do the job. Place the trap in some dark corner in the kitchen, preferably under the sink or similar place and wait one night. Cockroaches will be attracted to the smell, climb on top of the glass using the sock and fall into it and the drown in the liquid

The Vegas roach trap is a good way to find out whether there are cockroaches in the home, but it cannot cope with larger infestations. In case there are a lot of cockroaches it is always a good idea to call a professional pest controller for advice.

How To Tell If You Have Roaches is a post from: deBugged - The Rentokil Blog

Good to know that nature has many things in store for flies. Gruesome death comes in many forms. One especially wicked and fast end for flies comes in the form of a larger fly. When I first learned about Robber flies, I just thought it very fair that at least some flies take the responsibility to clean up the mess caused by their pest relatives.

Robber flies (Asilidae) are the perfect predator: Large compound eyes (often in funky metallic colours) and a face moustached with bristles (called Mystax), which protects them against possible moves of defense of their prey, not that this would be a real threat, though.

They have a very short and strong proboscis (= mouth part), which they use to stab their victim. They often hunt in flight and once they have caught their prey, which also includes wasps (very good!), spiders, butterflies and other insects, they inject their saliva which contains enzymes and neurotoxins, paralyzing and dissolving the organs of their victims. They later suck in the liquefied victim and leave an empty shell. Imagining a human with a metal straw attacking a tender coconut, well you get the idea.

The sad part is that these guys don’t seem to do too well in cities and prefer a more natural setup. House flies, bottle flies and fruit flies on the other hand thrive in human environment. Hence, we have to take care of the cities, through proper sanitation, insect proofing of our homes and of course electronic light and glue board traps. Considering that life in the countryside holds innumerable ways of dying for these pests, ranging form being stabbed and sucked dry by robber flies and spiders, being eaten up in a whole by reptiles, amphibians and birds, being eaten up slowly and alive by dragonflies and ants, I understand that a life in the city sounds much safer… If it were not for us pest controllers, harr harr harr.

It’s Fly Season is a post from: deBugged - The Rentokil Blog

Eat those pests!

Food is important, food keeps us going… Well, let us see what the news had to say about this.

I had posted a link here earlier, but I still find it amazing that agricultural pest control threatens a famous local Brazilian delicacy: Ants! The Alates ( or swarmers) are considered a big delicacy and become increasingly rare. Personally I would be very interested in tasting some of these ants. Supposedly they taste like mint, yummy. Saves the money on chewing gum and candies, ha ha ha.

Insects as a solution to solve the global hunger problem and to reduce green house gas emissions? It seems to be possible and this was published this week. Insects produce less wastage and by-products compared to cows, pigs and other ‘more common’ livestock. Plus the food input is comparatively low and I remember I read somewhere that insect proteins are easier to digest for humans. Well then, instead of a nice steak, we might soon have a few barbequed grasshopper legs, medium to rare, please…

Imagine a 20 pound rat, baked in the oven, maybe for Christmas? Delicious? Not so sure about that, but in Cameroon there are farms that breed the giant cane rat. These are huge rodents, the size of a small sized dog, so I guess it makes sense having these as a food source. I was of the opinion that our Indian bandicoot rats are huge, but there always seems to be an even larger pest. Just give it a fancy name, “Rongeur giant au vin”, and you will have a lot of people in front of your restaurant. Well, not if Rentokil comes round for some serious rodent control.

Eat those humans!

Ok, shall we turn around the perspective of eater vs. eaten? January had quite an arrangement of odd “pests attacking humans” stories as well. Let’s start with the most disturbing ones.

A New York prisoner got bitten into his very private parts by a rat. This is by far the most disturbing rat bite case that I heard of. Then there was the case of the woman who died after her toes had been eaten by rodents. It seems that this year the rodents plan to fight back. Well, we are prepared to control them.

There also was a report about children that found a Chihuahua being eaten by ants. I think since the dog had obviously been mistreated and was not able to stand, nor walk. I also guess that the ants were rather attacking if it was in the close proximity of the nest, than actually trying to eat it.

And then there was the viral video about a loose rat in New York’s subway. My learning from this incident? Never, never ever, sleep on a subway. Why? Because there are mad rats that run up your legs and come running into your face. This is something I would not even wish to my worst enemies.

A few days later I found an article that guesstimates the number of rodents on Bangalore express trains to be around 4,000. I have seen rats on trains and I have also seen the amount of food, crumbs, garbage and spillages that is produced during a 10-20 hour train rides. It is not a surprise that rodents and other pests are attracted to train rides. In this case, it would be good if the passengers would also be made aware that their eating habits are a major part of the rat problem on trains.

Which finally brings me to some better news: The city of Mumbai has its own rodent killer task force. Within the last year, 44 night catchers and another 140 day catchers have killed more than 310,000 rats. However they still require more hands to somehow control the menace of rodents.

So much about the pest news for the last three weeks, hope I do not have to write too soon about similar news

Rat bites in ‘private’ parts, human eating pests and vice versa is a post from: deBugged - The Rentokil Blog

Recently, these have been quite hot topics:

• Japanese Encephalitis  in Uttar Pradesh
• Dengue in Delhi
• Malaria in Chennai

While these are rather scary reports, once in a while I get the odd report that forces a smile on my lips or in contrast contains an especially appalling description out of a nightmare. In the last week I found three incidents I thought worthwhile to share with you.

“30 hours aboard the ‘Cockroach Express’”  was the headlines of an interesting (ok, rather scary) article about travelling on the Geetanjali Express from Howrah to Mumbai. Imagine finding one cockroach in your bed. Disturbing? Now imagine hundreds of cockroaches in your bed, climbing in your luggage and even worse, into your shirts and pants. To add to the scare, it is a 30 hour train ride. On top of all that, some passengers found cockroaches in their food and contracted a food poisoning. I think this is a prime example for the necessity of proper pest control measures.

A rather bizarre article was about a pet rat that caused a fire. Well, nothing funny about the fire, but as we know, rodents are known to chew on insulation and electric wiring, to keep their teeth sharp and intact, and thus can cause short circuits and fires.

Well, the ‘pet rat incident’  is somewhat different. The rat was allowed to roam around freely in the home, and had built a nest in its cage, hoarding different rubbish materials, including empty beer cans and paper. One day the rat collected a smoldering cigarette butt and carried it in its nest. Subsequently the nest caught fire and burned the cage. Luckily the fire alarm went off and fire fighters managed to prevent further damage. This is the first time I hear of a ‘nicotine addicted’ rat as the cause for a fire. Guess smoking has more ways to kill you than one might expect.

An interesting read was an article about the so-called “Rat Man”, Lab technician Pravin Ghuge at Parel’s Haffkine Institute in Mumbai. He is the only person who stands between the Plague and the city of Mumbai. His job is to analyze randomly collected rat samples (around 200 rats dissected per day) for the plague. The sad part of this is, that his unit is understaffed and to properly protect Mumbai from the Plague, more lab technicians like him would be required to analyze more rodents on a daily basis. Luckily, plague outbreaks have become very rare everywhere across the globe. So far no infected rats have been found in Mumbai. Fingers crossed, for the future.

If you come across other interesting pest news, please do share them with us.

A Smoking Rat, a Ride on the ‘Cockroach Express’ and other News is a post from: deBugged - The Rentokil Blog

I heard of Bamboo flowering as a major event for the first time, when I talked to a wildlife guard in Nagarhole National Park. We talked about elephants, and how they sometimes can become a problem for farmers, raiding their fields for crops, when the guard mentioned that these incidents would increase over the next few years, as the bamboo flower had started.

Bamboo flower? Elephants? I was quite puzzled. He explained that one of the main food sources of elephants is the giant Bamboo, and that this species of bamboo flowers every 40-50 years all over India at the same time. After flowering and producing incredible amounts of seeds, all plants die. Hence the elephants starve and start looking for alternative food sources and become a nuisance for farmers.

The second time I heard of the bamboo flower was while travelling in Kerala, where I purchased some bamboo rice, supposedly at best a natural aphrodisiac, but healthy at the least. Quite costly though, and quite tasty. While negotiating the price I watched a group of monkeys plucking the seeds of the bamboo plants. They looked fat and healthy. Convinced me to purchase the bamboo rice.

Pic credit: Benjamin Harink

Happy monkeys, hungry elephants, what else? Well there is an even more dramatic and tragic connection between rats and the bamboo flower. The amount of seeds produced by a single bamboo plant is immense and feeds a number of animals, among all others rodents seem to profit a lot from the bamboo flower. The Eastern regions of India, especially the state of Mizoram are, to a large extent, covered with giant bamboo (Melcocanna baccifera). On the one hand, this bamboo provides building materials, tools and even food (remember the bamboo shoots, you might have come across in a Chinese restaurant?) to the locals, on the other hand, once it starts flowering it initiates a dangerous chain reaction.

Once the bamboo bears fruit, millions of bandicoot rats (in this case mainly: Bandicota savilei) are attracted by the bounty of this easily accessible source of protein. They do what they are best at; eat and breed. Considering that these rats can produce a litter every three weeks and baby rats can reach maturity within 50 – 60 days, the numbers of rodents reach huge numbers within a short period.

The problem that arises from this fast multiplication is that even though bamboo seed resources are vast, they are limited. Once everything is finished, hungry rats come out of the bamboo forest and raid the farmers’ fields. Since there are millions of them, there is no remorse and everything is consumed, leaving the farmers and their families starving. Local administration tried to fight the army of rodents, offering the equivalent of USD 2.50 for every 100 rats killed. When the bamboo flowering started, villagers killed around 500,000 rodents a year; 2 years later in the peak of the bamboo flower they already killed 2.5 million rats per year.

However, even by killing 2.5 million of rats, it is still not possible to prevent multitude of rats from marauding the fields; they leave nothing for the farmers. In the past there have been major famines caused by the flood of rats subsequently to bamboo flowering. This time the local government has taken provisions to store more food in rodent-proof warehouses to prevent another famine. According to a BBC report pest control measures are largely un-coordinated and on an individual scale, hence not sufficient. Preparation and an integrated approach will be the solution to prevent the next army of marauding rodents, in a few decades.

Driving through National parks, and seeing the dead bamboo is a somewhat depressing sight. It will take a few years for new plants to grow to the imposing size of their parents. By the way, did you know that the aphids on the giant bamboo are very large and the food source for the largest ladybug in the world?

Spanish Translation

Bambú y Ratas – Flores y Hambruna

Los términos “bambú”, “ratas”, “flor” y “hambruna” no parecen tener mucha conexión entre ellos. Sin embargo, cada cincuenta años más o menos, la conexión entre estas palabras se hace más que evidente en India.

La primera vez que oí hablar del florecimiento del bambú como un gran acontecimiento fue cuando hablé con el guarda de los animales silvestres del Parque Nacional de Nagarhole. Empezamos a hablar sobre los elefantes y sobre cómo a veces pueden llegar a ser un problema para los granjeros, arrasando las cosechas para alimentarse, y entonces el guarda me contó que en los próximos años se espera que aumente este tipo de incidentes, ya que el bambú ha empezado a florecer.

¿Flor del bambú? ¿Elefantes? No entendía nada. Entonces el guarda me explicó que una de las mayores fuentes de alimentos para los elefantes es el bambú gigante, y que esta especie florece cada 40 ó 50 años en toda India al mismo tiempo. Después de florecer y de producir una cantidad enorme de semillas, todas las plantas mueren. Por tanto, los elefantes empiezan a tener mucha hambre y buscan otras fuentes de comida alternativas, convirtiéndose en un problema para los granjeros.

La segunda vez que oí hablar de la flor del bambú fue durante un viaje a Kerala. Allí compré arroz de bambú, que no sólo es considerado como un afrodisíaco natural, sino que además es muy sano. Muy caro, pero muy sabroso. Mientras negociaba el precio vi un grupo de monos arrancando las semillas de las plantas de bambú. Los monos estaban gordos y parecían sanos, así que eso me terminó de convencer para comprar el arroz de bambú.

Monos felices, elefantes hambrientos, ¿qué más? Bueno, hay una conexión más dramática  y trágica todavía entre las ratas y la flor de bambú. La cantidad de semillas que produce una sola planta de bambú es inmensa, y sirve para alimentar a numerosos animales, entre ellos los roedores, que parecen disfrutar mucho con la flor del bambú. Las zonas orientales de India, especialmente el Estado de Mizoram, están casi completamente cubiertos por bambú gigante (Melcocanna baccifera). Por una parte, este bambú también les proporciona materiales de construcción, herramientas e incluso comida (acordaos de los brotes de bambú, seguramente los hayáis visto en los restaurantes chinos), aunque por otra parte, cuando empieza a florecer, comienza una peligrosa reacción en cadena.

Una vez que el bambú produce la fruta, millones de ratas bandicoot (en este caso especialmente  Bandicota savilei) son atraídas por esta fuente de proteínas tan fácilmente accesible. Hacen lo que mejor se les da hacer: comer y reproducirse. Teniendo en cuenta que estas ratas pueden dar a luz crías cada tres semanas y que las crías de rata alcanzan la madurez en 50 ó 60 días, el número de roedores se multiplica por miles en poco tiempo.

El problema de esta rápida multiplicación de ratas es que aunque los recursos de semillas de bambú son grandes, son también limitados. Una vez que se acaban las existencias, las ratas hambrientas dejan el bosque de bambú y arrasan los campos de los granjeros. Los millones de ratas no sienten remordimiento alguno, y arrasan con todo lo que encuentran, dejando a los granjeros y a sus familias muertos de hambre. Las administraciones locales han intentado luchar con este ejército de roedores, ofreciendo el equivalente a 2,5 dólares americanos por cada 100 ratas matadas. Cuando empezó el florecimiento del bambú empezó, los habitantes de los pueblos mataban alrededor de 500.000 roedores al año, dos años más tarde, en temporada alta de flor del bambú, esta cifra ha llegado a 2,5 millones de ratas al año.

Sin embargo, incluso matando 2,5 millones de ratas, no es posible evitar que un montón de ratas merodeen los campos; no dejan nada para los granjeros. En el pasado ha habido grandes hambrunas provocadas por la avalancha de ratas derivadas del florecimiento del bambú. Esta vez el la administración local ha tomado precauciones almacenando más comida en almacenes a prueba de roedores para evitar otra hambruna. Según un informe de la BBC las medidas de control de plagas no están coordinadas y sólo se hacen a escala individual, y por tanto son insuficientes. La preparación y un enfoque integrado serán la solución para evitar el siguiente ejército de roedores merodeadores en las siguientes décadas.

Conducir a través de parques nacionales y ver el bambú muerto es de alguna manera un paisaje deprimente. Harán falta algunos años para que las nuevas plantas lleguen a alcanzar el imponente tamaño de las anteriores. Por cierto, sabíais que los áfidos del bambú gigante son muy grandes y una gran fuente de alimento para la mayor mariquita del mundo?

Of Bamboo and Rats – Flowers and Famines is a post from: deBugged - The Rentokil Blog

To give an idea, did you know that:

• Sometimes children have become anemic due to multiple and ongoing feedings by bed bugs. And parents may not even be able to trace to bed bugs as the cause.

• Even a few crumbs that slip down beside a stove, for example, can serve as a gourmet dinner for several cockroaches for some time.
• Cockroaches reproduce quickly. For every one you see there can be 200 more hiding and multiplying behind your walls.

• As many as 33 million microorganisms may flourish in a single fly’s gut, while half-billion more swarm over its body and legs. A fly deposits thousands of bacteria each time it lands.

These interesting pest facts take us a step closer to pest awareness which can prevent damage to health and properties and in some cases save lives.

One side effect however might be that discussions about pests stop the game at times. Everyone has a pest control story – what’s yours?

The Pest Game is a post from: deBugged - The Rentokil Blog

Interestingly the tolerance for pests is very low and the knowledge about pests is higher in places where there are lesser pests. It is my personal perception that the tolerance towards certain pests is a direct effect of exposure. This might not be true in all cases, but I noticed that if people are almost never exposed to certain pests, they tend to freak out much more.

The tropic/ subtropic climate of India is conducive for a large range of pests. Cockroaches, for instance, are a very common sight in “hotter” countries and people in general are quite tolerant towards cockroaches.

One pest that the public is very well educated about is mosquitoes, mainly because they transmit a wide range of diseases, e.g. Chikungunya, Dengue and Malaria. However, other lesser-known pest species are similarly injurious to our health and the public is yet to be made aware of these pests. To give an example, rodents are frequently the cause for outbreaks of Leptospirosis (or Weil’s disease); cockroaches are triggers for allergies and asthma and food poisoning; flies transmit Cholera, Dysentery and many more.

Children are most sensitive to contaminations and health risks posed by pests. At the same time children are quite alert and receptive for new knowledge. Furthermore, children, as future thought leaders, will play an important role in pest and disease prevention, if they are made aware of these topics.

In an effort to increase public awareness we initiated pest awareness programs for schools. An interactive presentation introduced children into the world of pests and taught them some basic behavioural guide lines to keep pests out of their homes. The schools were very supportive of this kind of activity and the overall reception was very good. The entire team that helped and conducted the seminars enjoyed the activity of explaining the work we do and educating others about pests.

It is always better to know the enemy in order to prevent health risks and damage to your property. Keeping friends close, but enemies closer, does not apply here though.

The Importance of Public Pest Awareness is a post from: deBugged - The Rentokil Blog