Can There Be A Boom Or Bust Coming For Natural Pest Control
The planet is definitely green. "Green" could be your color of environmental stress, the impetus which compels cuttingedge technology, the buzz word of the socially conscious. Concern for the natural environment and man's impact on it's bringing a ton of new services to promote , and pest control isn't any exception. Environmentally-friendly pest control providers are growing in popularity, especially in the commercial sector. Even eco-savvy residential individuals are asking about natural alternatives to traditional pesticides, but their ardor often cools when confronted with the 10% to 20% cost differential and lengthier treatment times, some times several weeks.
The raising of America's environmental awareness, along with increasingly stringent national regulations regulating traditional chemical dyes, appears to be altering the pest control industry's attention on Integrated Pest Management (IPM) techniques. IPM is regarded as merely safer to the environment, however safer for people, pets and secondary scavengers such as owls. Of 378 pest control businesses surveyed in 2008 by Pest Control Technology magazine, twothirds said they offered IPM professional services of some sort.
Instead of lacing pest websites with a poisonous cocktail of powerful insecticides designed to kill, IPM focuses on environmentally-friendly prevention techniques made to keep insects out. While non - or no-toxicity services and products might also be utilised to encourage pests to pack their bags, elimination and control efforts focus on finding and eliminating the root of infestation: entry points, attractants, harborage and food.
Notably popular with schools and assisted living facilities charged with protecting the fitness of the world's youngest and oldest citizens, those at highest risk from poisonous chemicals, IPM is grabbing the attention of hotels, office buildings, apartment complexes and other commercial sectors, as well as eco-conscious residential customers. Driven in equal parts by ecological concerns and health danger fears, curiosity about IPM is attracting a host of fresh environmentally-friendly pest management products -- both high- and low tech -- to advertise.
In an Associated Press interview published on MSNBC on the past April, Green explained,"A mouse can squeeze through a gap the size of a pen diameter. Therefore, in the event that you've received a quarter-inch gap underneath your doorway, so much as a mouse is concerned, there's no door there whatsoever." Cockroaches can slither via a one eighth inch crevice.
IPM is"a better way to pest control to the wellness of the house, the surroundings and the household," said Cindy Mannes, spokeswoman for the National Pest Management Association, the $6.3 billion pest control industry's own trade association, in the same Associated Press story. However, because IPM is still a rather recent addition to this pest control toolbox, Mannes cautioned that there's minimal industry consensus on this is of green services.
Identifying pest control services and products and companies which eschew conventional pesticides in favor of environmentally-friendly control methods, GSC is backed by the EPA, Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) and HUD. IPM prefers mechanical, physical and cultural procedures to control pests, but may use bio-pesticides produced from naturally-occurring materials like animals, bacteria, plants and certain minerals.
Hazardous chemical sprays are giving way to new, sometimes unconventional, methods of pests. Others, like trained dogs that sniff out bed bugs, seem decidedly low tech, but apply innovative techniques to reach effects.
Yet another new pest control procedure is contraceptive. When bay area was jeopardized by mosquitoes carrying potentially life-threatening West Nile Virus, bicycle messengers were hired to flee the city and drop packets of biological insecticide in to the city's 20,000 storm drains. A kind of contraceptive for mosquitoes, the new method was considered safer compared to airborne spraying with the compound pyrethrum, the typical mosquito abatement procedure, according to a recent story posted within the National Public Radio site.
Of course there are efforts underway to build a better mouse trap. The innovative Track & Trap system brings rats or mice to a food channel dusted with powder. Rodents leave a blacklight-visible course that allows pest control experts to secure entry paths. Coming soon, night watch uses pheromone research to trap and lure bed bugs. In Englanda sonic device made to repel rats and squirrels is being analyzed, along with the aptly named Rat Zapper is purported to supply a lethal shock using two AA batteries.
With this influx of new environmentally friendly services and products rides a posse of regulations. Critics of recent EPA regulations restricting the sale of certain pest-killing chemicals accuse the government of unfairly limiting a homeowner's ability to guard his property. Even the EPA's 2004 banning of the chemical diazinon for household usage a couple of years ago removed a potent ant-killer from the homeowner's insect control toolbox. Similarly, 2008 EPA regulations prohibiting the selling of small amounts of effective rodenticides, unless sold inside a specific trap, has eliminated rodent-killing compounds from the shelves of both hardware and home improvement stores, limiting the homeowner's capacity to secure his property and family from such disease-carrying insects.
Acting for the public good, the authorities pesticide-control actions are particularly aimed at protecting children. In additional hints with a May 20, 2008 report CNN online, a study performed by the American Association of Poison Control Centers suggested that the rat poison was responsible for almost 60,000 poisonings between 2001 and 2003, 250 of them resulting in serious accidents or death. National Wildlife Service analyzing in California found rodenticide deposit in most creature tested.
Individuals are embracing the notion of pest control and environmentally friendly, cutting off pest control products and techniques. Availability and government regulations are limiting consumers' self-treatment alternatives, forcing them to turn to professional pest control organizations for relief from pest invasions. As it's established a viable solution for business clients, few residential customers seem willing to pay higher charges for newer, more more labor intensive green pest control products and much fewer are willing to wait the additional week or two it may possibly take these items to do the job. It is taking direction efforts for pest control companies to teach consumers in the long term advantages of green and natural pest treatments.
Though the cold, hard truth is that if individuals have a problem with pests they are interested gone and so they need it gone today! If rats or rodents are in their house destroying their property and endangering their family disease, if termites or carpenter ants are eating their home equity, even in case roaches are invading their toilet or if they're sharing their bed with bed bugs, consumer attention in environmental surroundings plummets. When folks call a pest control company, the most important thing is that they want the bugs dead! Now! Pest control firms are standing up against the wave of consumer demand for prompt eradication by enhancing their green and natural pest control product offerings. These fresh organic products require the most responsible long-term strategy to pest control; one which protects our environment, children, and also our own wellness. Sometimes it is lonely moving from the wave of popular demand, but true leadership, at the pest control business, means embracing these fresh natural technologies when they are not popular with the consumer - yet.
