Paper Wasps

Habitat

• Paper Wasps, Hornets and Yellow Jackets construct nests of a paper-like material, which is a mixture of finely chewed wood fragments and secretions of saliva from the wasps
• Paper wasps build umbrella-shaped nests under eaves and ledges

Exterminating Paper Wasps

• Not as aggressive as Yellow Jackets or Hornets
• Most wasp and hornet sprays available at the hardware store will kill Paper Wasps.
• Treat at night to kill Paper Wasps.
• You can treat for Paper Wasps during the daytime as long as you stand somewhere away from the nest while you spray.
• Most insecticide sprays will kill a wasp or hornet on contact.
• After you have treated a nest, wait one day and then get rid of the nest. This keeps other pests from taking up residence there.

Contact Us

Contact us for help with a problem with Paper Wasps. You may also call either our Central Coast office or our Ventura County office.

Where Found

• Native lands: China, Japan, Korea and Taiwan
• First discovered in Allentown, Pennsylvania in September of 1998; probably actually came to the states several years earlier

Since 1998 the stink bug has been reported in 23 states, and that number is growing.

Characteristics

• Known as an agricultural pest
• Recently, serious pest of fruit, vegetable and farm crops in the Mid-Atlantic region
• Probable it will become a pest of these commodities in other areas in the United States
• Moves indoors in fall
• May make an occasional appearance throughout the winter when weather is warmer
• Comes out in the spring

Contact Us

Contact us for problems with Brown Marmorated Stink Bugs. You may also call either our Central Coast office or our Ventura County office.

• One of the three largest spider groups

Family Structure

• The family Araneidae is diverse

Appearance

• Vary in colors, sizes, and shapes
• Eight similar eyes, arranged in two rows of four eyes each
• Have rather poor eyesight and rely on shaking within the web to find their meals
• Four to six spinnerets, from which they produce strands of silk
• Brightly colored
• Hairy or spiny legs

Habitat

• Webs consist of radial strands, like spokes of a wheel, and concentric circles
• Most build webs vertically, attaching them to branches, stems, or manmade structures
• Webs may be quite large, spanning several feet in width

Contact Us

Contact us for help with a problem with Ord Weavers. You may also call either our Central Coast office or our Ventura County office.

Appearance

Female

• Most easily recognized.
• Shiny black body
• Red mark shaped like an hourglass on her round abdomen

Male

• Harmless
• Half the female’s size
• Bands and spots of yellow and red on their backs
• Legs are much longer in proportion to his body than that of the female (approximately twice his body size)

Where Found

• North America

Characteristics

• Not usually deadly to adults since amount of venom injected is so small
• Will try to escape before biting
• Aggressive when guarding an egg mass or if cornered and pressed
• After mating, the female sometimes eats the male, earning the name “widow”

Contact Us

Contact us for help with a Black Widow Spider problem. You may also call either our Central Coast office or our Ventura County office.

Family Structure

• Queens can lay as many as 20-30 eggs in single day; usually lay only 1-2 (or less) eggs per day on average over long periods of time
• Egg to adult: 34–38 days
• Queens and male ants only produced in larger colonies
• Colonies range in size from 100 to 10,000
• Several queens (as many as 200 in some instances)

Habitat

• Indoors: colonize near heat sources or in insulation
• In hot and dry situations: nests have been found in house plants and even in the lids of toilets
• Outdoors: colonize under rocks and exposed soil
• Form colonies virtually anywhere, in a variety of conditions

Diet

• Scavengers/predators
• Will eat most household foods – especially those that contain sugar – as well as other insects.
• Collect honeydew to feed on from aphids, scale insects, and membracids

Characteristics

• Can trail extensive distances (though their trails are rarely longer than 50 feet)
• Usually travel along landscape edges
• More likely to invade homes after rain (which washes away the honeydew they collect)
• Highly tolerant of other ants
• Compound nests consisting of multiple ant species have been observed
• Non-aggressive

Contact Us

Contact us for help with a problem with Odorous House Ants. You may also call either our Central Coast office or our Ventura County office.

Beetles are the group of insects with the largest number of known species. They are members of the largest order of animals: Coleoptera.

• 25 percent of all life-forms
• 40 percent of all species of insects are from the beetle family (about 400,000 species)
• Total species: Some estimates as high as 100 million; 1 million more probable
• Largest family in the animal kingdom belongs to this order – the weevils or snout beetles

Family Structure

• Eggs: Each female has several dozen to several thousand over the course of her lifetime
• Morph after birth into a completely different body structure
  • First stage: larvae. May last several years in some species
  • Second stage: pupa
  • Third stage: adult

Appearance

• Body: head, thorax, and abdomen

Habitat

• Found in almost all habitats, including freshwater and marine
• Live wherever vegetative foliage grows – in tree bark, flowers, leaves, underground near roots, inside plant tissue

Diet

• Plants and fungi
• Break down animal and plant debris
• Other invertebrates

Characteristics

• Prey of other animals, including birds and mammals
• Some are agricultural pests (e.g., boll weevil, red flour beetle, Colorado potato beetle, and cowpea beetle)
• Others are important to controlling other agricultural pests (i.e., beetles in the family of ladybirds or ladybugs eat other insects that damage crops)

Contact Us

Contact us for help with a Beetle problem. You may also call either our Central Coast office or our Ventura County office.

Habitat

• More dangerous and harder to control than Paper Wasps
• Nests look like a large, upside-down, teardrop-shaped ball; usually attached to a tree, bush or the side of a building
• Nests may house thousands of hornets
• Very aggressive if nest is disturbed
• Nests are often located out of reach
• Removal is safest if performed by a professional pest control company; it requires proper suits and removal equipment

Contact Us                 

Contact us for help with a Hornet problem. You may also call either our Central Coast office or our Ventura County office.

It is said that infestations of Bed Bug are on the increase (some estimate as much as 5,000 percent). But don’t get the bleach out just yet. You are as likely to have picked them up in your suitcase while traveling as through unsanitary conditions.

Family Structure

• Eggs: white, about 1mm long
• Nymphs look like adults, but smaller
• Egg to adult: four weeks to several months, depending on temperature and food available (See the feeding chart to the right)

Appearance

• Flat, brown, wingless
• About 1/4 of an inch long
• 6 legs
• Shiny reddish-brown; appear dark brown and swollen after a feeding (see the picture below)
• Can be seen with the human eye but do a great job of hiding
• “True Bugs” –piercing mouthparts (usually feed on plants)
• Bed Bugs have adapted to feeding on human blood

Habitat

• Wherever people work or live – houses, apartments, hospitals, business offices

Bed Bugs love to hide. You could find them in:

• The seams of your mattress
• Seams in sofas and couches
• In small cracks in wooden furniture
• Underneath furniture
• Under throw rugs, carpeting, baseboards and casings
• Inside electrical fixtures
• Inside electronics, like the TV, stereo, and phone
• Backpacks, sleeping bags, clothes
• Behind wallpaper, picture frames and other dark areas

Diet

• Human blood
• Live up to a year without feeding
• Nymphs can survive several months without feeding
• Adult feeding: 10 to 15 minutes
• Nymphs: Less than 10 minutes
• Typically feed every three days.

Danger of Infection

Bed Bugs are not known to carry diseases as of yet. It is said that feeding on your blood will not cause you any harm; however, a Bed Bug that has just finished feeding can explode with just a little pressure, allowing you to come in contact with blood. If that blood is infected, you could run a risk of infection.

Scratching Bed Bug bites may lead to infection, too.

How do you know if you have Bed Bugs?

Finding bed bugs in your home has nothing to do with poor hygiene. It takes only one Bed Bug hitching a ride on your clothing (furniture, suitcase, etc.) to infest your entire residence.

Bites

Bed Bug bites are the best way to determine if you have Bed Bugs. In the photo below you’ll see a visitor who was bitten by Bed Bugs. He itched throughout the night; and when he went in to check, this is what he found!

Just a few simple precautions can prevent another occurrence of this problem. Study this information to help determine if you have Bed Bugs, how to deal with infestations, pictures of Bed Bug bites (from people around the world) and – most important – how to protect yourself during travel!

The image to your left is a severe reaction, and you may find that your bites are not this bad. Not everyone reacts the same way. If you have such a reaction, check with your doctor, who may recommend an antihistamine or topical cream to relieve itching and/or burning.

Mold-Like Spots

Another sign of Bed Bugs is mold-like spots on your mattress. If you question whether you have them, check your mattress.

What do you do if you suspect an infestation?

If you suspect you have an infestation, contact a licensed exterminator.

Contact Us

Contact us for help with a Bed Bug problem. You may also call either our Central Coast office or our Ventura County office.