Your Zero Bug 2015 Pest Prevention Checklist

I dare you to say that title 10 times fast. I know it is a mouthful, but it's true. You can start living with zero bugs in 2015 if you follow this checklist. Some of these tips you can do yourself, but to get 100% protection, you'll need to partner with a pest management company. But whether you go all the way, or just do some of this checklist, you'll have significantly fewer bugs and rodents threatening your home and your health this new year.

Many homeowners don't realize this, but bugs choose the home they want to live in. And, there are only a few criteria they use to make their decision. The primary needs of humans are food, clothing, and shelter. Pests have those same needs--well, except for the clothing. Food and shelter are the two driving forces of all pests. Hiding food from pests can cause them to choose another place to be.

HIDE FOOD

• Put dishes in soapy water, instead of in a dry stack.

• Keep all trash cans sealed. If you have a trash with a rocker lid, consider replacing it.

• Deep clean around oven and under refrigerator.

• Clean counters, floors, and rugs regularly.

• Store cereal, pantry foods, a pet food in hard plastic containers.

• Keep fruit in the fridge till you're ready to eat it.

DON'T PROVIDE SHELTER

• Use a caulking gun to seal any holes, cracks, or gaps in your exterior walls. Be sure to fill in gaps around windows, fixtures, pipes, outlets, and other objects that pass through your exterior walls.

• When sealing your walls, be sure to look in hard-to-see places, like under the deck, porch, stairways, and behind bushes and shrubs.

• Seal cracks in your basement walls.

• Check all your screens, doors sweeps, and weather stripping.

• Cut tree branches away from your roofline.

• Put wire mesh in the bottom of your downspouts.

• Put pointy spikes where phone and power lines touch your house.

• Get a pest management company to come in and check your work. They can find entry points you might have missed, and give exclusion tips that are specific to your home.

To seal your wall 100% you need to understand that some bugs don't eat the food we eat. Some bugs eat wood. To protect yourself from wood-eating insects, you'll need to have routine inspections from a certified pest management professional. They can put monitoring devices in the ground and use limited and focused pesticides to protect places where your home is vulnerable.

If you do all this, you will be bug free in 2015. The only bugs in your home will be the ones that fly in when you enter the house and the ones that get carried in on clothing, in bags, and on the soles of your shoes. If you've never lived bug free, let me tell you, it is worth all the effort and every single penny.