Fun Facts
This insect can live for up to a week without its head, eventually dying only because it can't drink water.
What is a Cockroach?
This acronym stands for the personal protective equipment technicians must wear before handling any pest treatments.
What is PPE?
This German variety is notorious for multiplying rapidly indoors and leaving behind pepper-like droppings in kitchens.
What is the German Cockroach?
These small, red-eyed flies are heavily attracted to fermenting fruits, rotting vegetables, and dirty drains.
What are Fruit Flies?
This rodent can squeeze through a hole the size of a dime and is known for its excellent climbing skills and long, hairless tail.
What is the House Mouse?
Because they don't have ears on their heads, these classic chirping pests actually "hear" using special organs located on their front legs.
What are Crickets?
This is the primary document technicians must consult to find the legal application rates, safety warnings, and targeted pests for any chemical.
What is the pesticide label?
Named for their favorite structural food source, these insects cause billions of dollars in property damage annually by digesting cellulose.
What are Termites?
Unlike bees, these aggressive, yellow-and-black striped wasps can sting multiple times and frequently build paper nests under eaves.
What are Yellowjackets?
Also known as the sewer rat, this heavy-bodied rodent prefers burrowing underground and has a tail shorter than its body.
What is the Norway Rat?
This armored, moisture-loving pest isn't actually an insect at all, but rather a land-dwelling crustacean that breathes through gills.
What is a Pillbug (or Roly-Poly / Woodlouse)?
This three-word approach to pest management focuses on restriction, exclusion, and minimized chemical use.
What is Integrated Pest Management?
This blood-sucking pest hides in mattress seams and can survive for months without a meal, causing red, itchy welts on humans.
What is a Bed Bug?
This airborne pest is notorious for spreading West Nile Virus and laying its eggs in stagnant, standing water.
What is a Mosquito?
This masked nocturnal mammal is a common urban scavenger known for tipping over trash cans and nesting in chimneys or attics.
What is a Racoon?
To communicate and guide their colony to food, these highly organized insects leave behind a invisible chemical trail made of pheromones.
What are Ants?
To prevent chemical backflow into a public water system, field techs use this physical gap or specific valve device.
What is an air gap (or backflow preventer)?
This is the technical term for pest debris and excrement, often resembling fine sawdust or pepper, which technicians use to identify wood-destroying organism infestations.
What is Frass?
This fabric-destroying pest lays eggs in dark closets, where its larvae feed aggressively on wool, silk, and feathers.
What is the Webbing Clothes Moth?
These flying mammals are protected in many states, meaning technicians must use one-way exclusion valves rather than harming them during a removal.
What are Bats?
Despite their tiny brains, these buzzing pests are master mathematicians, using a complex "waggle dance" to calculate angles and distances to food sources.
What are Honeybees?
This term describes the mechanical practice of sealing cracks, crevices, and entry points to physically block pests from entering a structure.
What is Exclusion?
This arachnid is easily identified by a violin-shaped marking on its cephalothorax and has a dangerously necrotic bite.
What is the Brown Recluse?
Often confused with sawdust, the fine powder left behind by this flying beetle's larvae signals severe damage to structural hardwoods.
What is the Powderpost Beetle?
This North American marsupial is famous for feigning death when threatened and acts as a natural pest control agent by eating thousands of ticks.
What is an Opossum?