Responding to the Pest Impacts of an Aggressive Hurricane Season

© Walker Pest Management

Editor’s note: David Schaedel, digital marketing manager, Walker Pest Management, Greenville, S.C., shared the following first-hand account of how Walker Pest Management has been impacted and is responding to this year’s hurricane season.

As the Southeast continues its slow recovery process from a series of devastating hurricanes, there have been a number of unique pest control problems that have arisen. In addition to the heavy rains, flooding, and downed trees, the weather has been unseasonably warm. This is combining to create a unique set of problems as we head into the end of fall. We’ve seen an uptick in termite, cockroach, and rodent issues across all of our clients. Here is what we are seeing and why.

TERMITES. With the increase in rainfall and warmer weather, termites across the Southeast have yet to slow down. In addition to the weather and moisture, areas hit by heavier hurricanes are facing two additional complications. First, there is an abundance of new dead wood, especially near homes. Homes with downed trees and snapped bushes now have dead brush piles stacked around their yards. While cities are working on cleaning these debris piles out, they are low on the priority list. Second, many homes suffered storm damage. Some of this damage around the home could have broken liquid barrier lines or destroyed bait station systems. Even though November is usually the end of termite season in a lot of the Southeast, it will be important to make sure that your customers' homes do not have any extenuating circumstances that could leave them vulnerable to termite damage.

COCKROACHES. As pest management professionals all know, American cockroaches thrive in high moisture environments. They also often live in bushes, shrubs, gardens, and debris piles. With several weeks of perfect conditions for these cockroaches, their populations have boomed. The storms have uprooted and destroyed a number of those living places, and the cockroaches are looking for new places to live. This has led to a large uptick in calls and concerns from customers who are seeing more and more American cockroaches move inside their homes. While these roaches often have no strong desire to live indoors, they will move wherever they have easy access to food, shelter, and water. That means that as their numbers grow more of them will move inside. Inevitably, customers that have never had issues will be giving you calls.

RODENTS. Similar to cockroaches, small rodents have had their ecosystems destroyed or disrupted. The warm weather and change in environment have led to more rodents roaming further to access food, shelter, and water. This paired with the fact the storm damage has opened new holes for rodents to enter crawlspaces and homes means that customers are going to be seeing more rodents than usual this year. While the weather has been warmer, a cold snap will drive more of these rodents indoors in the near future. In addition to simply baiting for the rodents, your teams may need to spend some extra time doing exclusion work to resolve newly created access points.

NO SILVER BULLET. There isn’t a single blanket solution that will work for all of your customers, but it is important to be prepared for a longer than usual pest season. Once the first few freezes hit, the season usually slows down until the following spring, but with the impact of the hurricanes, there may be a few more weeks or months of increased activity. This will vary from region to region, but in the Southeast the uptick in activity hasn’t come to an end yet.