Quote Of The Day

“Whether you think you can or whether you think you can’t, you’re right.”

— Henry Ford

Computer Problems

I ran into some computer problems that made it something of a challenge to blog today. I’ll be back in full blog mode tomorrow.

As If These People Don’t Have Enough Problems

It’s not bad enough to be homeless in Fayetteville, N.C. Now the Salvation Army’s homeless shelter is infested with bed bugs.

It horrifies me as an American that there are so many homeless people in Fayetteville that the Salvation Army is concerned about closing the center for even a few days because there would be so many people who would have no place to go to do a proper treatment.

I also wanted to congratulate Kerry Tremblay from Antex Exterminating and R.B. Goforth of Arrow Pest Control for doing a marvelous job of explaining bed bugs to the general public.

And I particularly wanted to thank them for letting people know that bed bugs are not connected with filth. It will be harder for people to dismiss the problem now just because the people being affected are homeless.

Quote Of The Day

“The significance of a man is not in what he attains but in what he longs to attain.”

— Khalil Gibran

Quote Of The Day

“There are only two kinds of people who are really fascinating: People who know absolutely everything, and people who know absolutely nothing.”

— Oscar Wilde

I’ll leave it to you to decide into which bucket I fall.

Reaching Kids Through Video Games

Erin Bauer, who is part of the Pesticide Safety Education Programs in the University of Nebraska-Lincoln Extension, has created this insanely cool game designed to teach kids about pests. She also played a large role in creating this program.

I’ve seen Bauer speak before, and it’s clear to me (and many others in Nebraska) that her creativity helps further the cause of the professional pest management industry. Kudos to her.

More Fun With Termites

Jack Watkins of Dow AgroSciences did a nice presentation on using baits and how to make them most effective. In the course of his talk, Watkins — who will be retiring at the end of the year after 37 years of meritorious service to the industry — provided technicians with an amusing (and useful) trick for figuring out whether you have one or multiple termite colonies at your customer’s property:

If you have monitoring stations out, take some termites from one station and some from another station and put them into a container. Leave them be and come back in the morning. Check the container in the morning, and if all of the termites are still there, they’re from the same colony. If half of them are gone, then you know you have two different colonies.

Oh, THAT’S Not Good News

Perhaps sitting in on this carpenter ant presentation by Justin Schmidt of the Southwestern Biological Institute was a bad idea.

Now he’s talking about the fact that the time of year they are most active is in the spring because that’s their breeding season (and he made a funny comment about the fact that they’re looking for carbohydrates at that time of year because “you can’t raise your kids on sugar.”).

But he told me that when they are foraging in winter, they are looking for sugars — and they are most likely not coming from outside. If they’re foraging in the winter, it’s likely that the nest is inside of the house’s walls.

I think it’s time for me to go back to bed.

They May Not Sting, But They Can Hurt

Justin Schmidt of the Southwestern Biological Institute told the PMPs that they should reassure homeowners that carpenter ants don’t sting.

Well, that’s all well and good, but when you try to stem the line of ants running down your window will with your bare hands (stop laughing), the fact that they “bite” instead of “sting” doesn’t make it any less painful.

Schmidt did explain to me what it is that causes the pain — it’s the injection of formic acid under the skin. Good to know (and no, I won’t be doing that again. See? I can be taught.)

I’m Trying To Become Invisible

Can any of you imagine how depressing it is to hear someone of the caliber of Justin Schmidt of the Southwestern Biological Institute go down the list of conducive conditions for carpenter ants and realize you have nearly all of them in my kitchen?

For example:

• Tree branches touching my roof? Check.
• Older tree near the house? Check.
• Voids in which the carpenter ants can live? Check.
• Sugary snacks on the counter to attract them? Check.
• Moisture sources? Check (broken garbage disposal in the kitchen sink and a dishwasher).
• Soft wood? Check (I have old hanging storm windows that have probably outlived their usefulness, but they’re clearly soft and in some cases have begun to rot).
• Gaps that they can get in? Check (the result of a construction truck crashing into my house — my neighbors — and a poor contractor to repair the job).
• Old railroad ties? Check (again, not mine — they’re in the neighbor’s “yard.”).

Sigh. This may require a much more expensive fix than I had been expecting.