Maintaining the interior and exterior areas of your home or business is critical to your health and comfort. Through Bug Blasted (a division of Kastle Kare), we provide service by licensed technicians who can eradicate pests and recommend an appropriate maintenance plan to keep your property free from bothersome pests.
Pest Control Services
Most treatments include the use of liquid chemicals and granules that are applied to the infested area. Once the product is applied and a pest walks through it, the residual remains on them and as they self-groom, they ingest the material and expire. Our regular pest control service includes a monthly or every other month treatment option – the frequency will depend on your specific situation and will be recommended to you based on our expert pest technicians assessment. Once you are on a regular maintenance plan, any intermittent treatments (for the same service) are covered under your regular service plan.
Green Products
We also offer eco-friendly or ‘green’ products to treat for general pest control. This includes an industry product that has a combination of Rosemary and Thyme oils along with other environmentally friendly natural materials that are toxic to pests. While this type of product is effective, it does require monthly service to maintain its effectiveness.
Common Pests & Insects
Ants
A single ant can lead the way for an entire colony to enter your property and invade your food and living space. While killing the ants immediately offers relief of the problem, it may not prevent them from coming back. Our Bug Blasted technicians look at two factors to service ants, including the source and the species. Ants live in colonies outside of your structure, usually somewhere around the perimeter. If they do live outside, they will forage their way indoors to search for food for the colony. They may also be living inside the structure, such as in the walls, voids, or underneath the foundation.
Sometimes ants come back because the type of ant has not been identified, and the treatment used does not affect that particular species of ant. Our Bug Blasted technicians investigate all factors of the ant problem so that we can begin to properly treat your structure and make sure the ants don’t return. We also recommend an ongoing maintenance plan to keep ants at bay.
Spiders
Spiders are more of a nuisance and are usually harmless. In fact, they prefer to avoid human contact. Spiders nest in cool damp areas, although depending on the species some thrive in a drier exterior climate, and they primarily feed off of other insects that are caught in their web. Common spiders have a more patterned style web and typically live in corners of rooms, usually around the baseboards or ceiling corners, and they enter to look for food.
More serious spiders, such as the poisonous Black Widow and Brown Recluse, have a very scattered web pattern with a thicker tension on the strands. Typically, they live outdoors in moist unobstructed areas where their webs go unnoticed, however it is not uncommon for them to be found in garage corners. Tarantulas are found around dry hillsides and in hotter conditions, but ultimately they are looking for food and not threatening unless cornered.
Earwigs & Sow Bugs
More commonly known as Pincher Bugs and Roly-Polies, these pests have an exoskeleton which causes them to be more challenging to control. Instead of relying on the pest to walk through the residual material used in the treatment, the product must be applied directly to the pest as well as the source, including places such as doorway thresholds where access commonly occurs.
Silverfish
Silverfish thrive in a warm, dry climate; typically the attics and walls of our structures are an ideal living space for them. They feed off of glue substances on the back of drywall tape, shelf paper and wallpaper. Another common area they can be found is behind electrical outlet covers, wall switch plates and kitchen drawers. Treatment for Silverfish involves an insecticide dust or desiccant which is a drying agent.
Cockroaches
Cockroaches thrive off of being crammed into one area as a group. In Southern California, the most commonly treated roach is the German cockroach, followed by the Oriental and then the American cockroach.
German & American Cockroaches have been known to carry infectious bacteria on their bodies. These bacteria may transfer to the food they come in contact with. Cockroaches have been known to be the cause of food poisoning, dysentery and diarrhea in humans. They can also produce allergens on their bodies and fecal matter. Sometimes, the American Cockroach has been implicated in causing respiratory problems and even childhood asthma.
- German cockroaches are 1/4″ to 1/2″ long and are light to dark brown and usually found in warm interior areas such as kitchens and storage areas.
- Oriental cockroaches are at least 1″ to 2″ long and solid black in color, and are usually found on the exterior of foundations in moist or wet areas.
- American cockroaches are usually 1″ to 2″ long and are light to dark brown and are usually found around sewer lines and moist, dark areas.
Crickets
Crickets are a harmless but an annoying pest due to their constant noise making which is caused by them rubbing their legs together. They reproduce rapidly, live in both wet and dry conditions. In order to treat for crickets on the inside of your structure, the source and location must be identified.
Fleas
Fleas are insects that have an exoskeleton and primarily live on your pet’s skin, however they can live amongst your plants in the yard. Fleas can hop great distances and thrive off of a blood source such as a cat, dog, rodent or any live animal. Fleas are dark-colored and are approximately 1/8†long. Typically, they are prevalent in areas where pets bed down or dig holes.
Fleas can be treated outdoors by our Plant Rx division but for infestations on the inside your home Bug Blasted pest technicians will treat the interior with an adulticide and growth regulator. Both treatments exterminate the immediate fleas, but more importantly stop the ability for eggs to hatch. This is critical since a flea can lay up to 500 eggs in their short lifetime.
Flies
Kastle Kare is the only company in Ventura Count that has been approved by the state of California to treat horse stables in an effort to control flies to an acceptable level. Flies in the home are usually a result of a door or window being left open, or they are responding to the methane gas excreted by expired rodents. In the latter case, our pest technicians can remove the expired rodent and solve the fly issue.
