Getting rid of a pest is nearly always easier than people expect, and keeping it out is nearly always harder. Almost every recurring infestation is a food or entry problem that has not been solved.
The common ones
- Ants. They are following a scent trail to a food source. Wipe the trail with hot soapy
water to break it, remove the food, and seal the gap they came through. Bait stations work better than sprays because the workers carry it back to the nest.
- Mice. They need a gap the width of a pencil. Steel wool and filler in every gap around
pipes and under units, food in sealed containers, and traps placed against walls where they actually run rather than out in the open.
- Moths. The larvae eat wool and they prefer dark, undisturbed, slightly soiled fabric.
Clean before storing, because it is the traces of you on the fibre they are after. Freezing an affected item for a few days kills eggs.
- Fruit flies. They breed in the last of something. Drains, the bottom of a bin, a
forgotten potato. A cider vinegar trap catches adults but the fix is finding the source.
- Silverfish. They want damp and starch. Fixing the damp is the fix, so see
What we will not tell you
Which branded product is best, unless we have tested it. What we will say is that for most household pests a bait beats a spray, because a spray kills what it lands on and a bait gets carried to the rest.
When to call somebody
Wasp nests, rats, bed bugs and anything in a wall cavity. Rats in particular are a public health matter and most councils will deal with them, sometimes free. Bed bugs are genuinely difficult and the domestic treatments sold for them mostly fail, which turns a two-week professional job into a six-month problem.