Providing pest control services in Berkshire, Buckinghamshire, Essex, Hampshire, Hertfordshire, Kent, London, Middlesex, Northamptonshire, Oxfordshire, Surrey, West Midlands, West Sussex, Wiltshire. Est. 1985.
How to get rid of Mice in Houses: Mice are different from rats in many respects. They are often tolerated more readily than rats because some people consider them ‘cute’. Mice can kill. They carry the same diseases that rats do and people are more likely to come into contact with items or foodstuff contaminated …
Removing Rats in the Autumn: Rats are an unceasing problem in the Autumn for a variety of reasons. Outside there is a natural abundance of food. Fields still have a lot of spilt grain on them from the harvest and there are many types of fruits and nuts in woods and hedgerows. Where there is …
Getting rid of Cluster Flies & Ladybirds in a House: The answer to this question is that practically it is not possible to eliminate hibernating Cluster Flies & Ladybirds for their hibernation site in a house. The reason for this is that the area where you are seeing the Cluster Flies and Ladybirds may only …
Grubs in a Wasp Nest: We recently had a call from a woman who had grubs (see photo) crawling out of beams in her bedroom. She sent pictures in and we (with the help of Killgerm) identified them as a type of Hover Fly larvae called Syrphidae. These in this case almost certainly came from …
Squirrels in Lofts: The Grey Squirrel is not a natural inhabitant of England. It was imported from North America and either deliberately or accidentally released in the South of England and spread, replacing the native Red Squirrel. They are classed as vermin and many efforts have been made to eliminate them by trapping and shooting. …
How long does a wasp nest take to die out?: At this time of year (Autumn) if a wasp nest is discovered then the question often gets asked: Is it worth treating the nest now as surely the wasp nest will die out in the Winter anyway? It is true that a wasp nest will …
Pest Control in Schools: Schools require a reliable, trustworthy (CRB Checked), reasonably priced and fast pest control service. At PEST UK we pass these criteria as we have pest control contracts and carry out many ‘one off’ pest control treatments in Schools throughout the South of England. The time period after or just before the …
Cluster Flies in the Autumn: Soon pest control companies will be getting calls about Cluster Flies. These are flies that hibernate in cavities, before humans made buildings they would use caves or hollow trees to spend the Winter. These flies are not the same as ‘normal’ flies such as House Flies or Blue Bottles and …
Wasps and wasp nests have been extremely low in numbers this year. This follows an ‘average’ year with regarding wasps and wasp nest populations in 2013 which was preceded by a disastrous year in 2012. I say disastrous, well it is for the pest control companies finances but not if you are trying to have …
Wasp Nests School: Although the wasp season this year has been ‘poor’ for pest control companies in the South of England there is always a burst of requests from Schools at this time of year. This demand peaks early September once the Schools open fully. The wasp nests have been able to expand in the …
False Widow Spiders in a Garage: We are still getting calls about False Widow Spiders. Even though they have been present in the UK for many years the recent publicity has lead to people being very wary of this type of spiders. Most spiders can bite but this is quite rare. Attached is a photo …
Although fleas can be a problem throughout the year they are more prevalent in the Summer and Autumn. Fleas in houses can increase during this period due to several reasons. First fleas are not active outside during the Winter, Spring and late Autumn. During the warmer weather they will survive outside and hedgehog fleas, rabbits …
Damage To Wood By Ants: Attached is a picture that Melissa took of ‘damage’ which ants have done to some wood. This ‘damage’ looks quite serious but ants will generally only take advantage of rotten wood or other materials to expand their nests. If the wood or other material is in a good state then …
Below are pictures that Nick Browning of PEST UK took of what is thought to be Solitary Wasp activity in wooden sleepers in a garden. The customer thought that they had wood worm. These types of wasps are different from ‘normal’ wasps as all female wasps lay eggs which hatch into grubs and turn into …
Mel (PEST UK’s only lady technician) recently fitted a sewer valve and took photo’s to demonstrate how they work. These valves are a cheap alternative to digging up a sewer to fix a breach. In fact the price of the supply and fitting of a sewer valve can be cheaper than the price to put …
German Cockroaches are a potential health hazard and can lead to an Environmental Health Officer to close a restaurant to protect the public. The picture below is that of cockroach monitoring traps laid in an Indian restaurant in Reading, Berkshire where PEST UK have a pest control contract. All of PEST UK’s food related contracts …
Like Bumble Bees, Honey Bees have been making a come back in the past few years. The increase has not been as dramatic as the increase in Bumble Bee nests but they have been increasing. This may be down to the increase in people keeping Honey Bees. The way new nests are formed is different …
We have just encountered an area of resistance to the rat poisons Difenacoum and Bromadiolone at a research centre in Compton Berkshire. Although one of the larger ‘local’ pest control companies in the supposedly hot bed of resistance that is Berkshire, at PEST UK we rarely get problems. One of the reasons is that we …
At PEST UK we have done (so far at the time of writing on 30/6/14) 134 wasp nests. Last June we did 163. Our turnover was much higher this year than last year this is due to the increase in Bee and other jobs. We posted a video of Rick Pellen who is PEST UK’s …
PROMPT/BASIS The PROMPT/BASIS organisation ensures that individual members (the individual is the member not the company) have the correct pest control qualification to start with, the minimum requirement for entry into the scheme is the Royal Society for Public Health (RSPH) Pest Control Certificate, The RSPH/BPCA Level 2 Award or Level 2 Certificate in pest …
The British Pest Control Association The British Pest Control Association or BPCA is a UK trade association for pest control companies. BPCA Accreditation differs from other pest control trade associations (such as the National Pest Technicians Association or npta) in that its members have to be fully trained, insured and abide by the BPCA’s code of …
Buy With Confidence The Buy With Confidence scheme was set up by Local Authorities with the help of Trading Standards. As yet the scheme does not cover the whole of the UK and the areas are based on Local Authority areas and currently most areas covered by the scheme are in London and the southern …
During the late 90’s and early 2000’s Bumble Bees were in decline. In the past three years pest control companies have been dealing with an increasing (this year was a record for Bumble Bees at PEST UK) number of Bumble Bee enquiries. I believe that this is due to the White Tailed Bumble Bee filling …
Today (28/5/14) Mel carried out a Bed Bug treatment in a multi occupancy house in the centre of Reading for a Lettings agency. The preparation prior to a bed bug treatment is vitally important: clothes have to be removed from the bedrooms, washed or briefly tumble dried before going back into the treated room(s) while …
Bees Swarm On Aeroplane: Yesterday Mel was called out to Tag at Farnborough airport to deal with a Honey Bee swarm on a plane. As can be seen by the picture this was an exceptionally large swarm. Mel contacted a bee keeper (pictured) who took the swarm away. Unfortunately he left several hundred worker bees …
Wasp Nest Removal & Treatment: We have just started doing ‘proper’ wasp nest treatments. I mean proper nests that are live and established as opposed to removing old wasp nests, just treating Queen Wasps emerging from hibernation or one of the types of bees (usually Mason, Mining, Honey or Bumble Bees), many call outs that …
Recently I treated a mouse infestation at a house near Guildford in Surrey. The Lady was clearly alarmed by the mice, although it was not until I actually looked around the house that she realised quite how many mice were in fact present! After I showed the lady the problems, she still seemed quite concerned, …
Ant Infestations: This past month have been our busiest April ever at PEST UK. Ants, especially in the latter part of the month have been the pest that has increased the most. As ants come out of hibernation they will forage inside as it is warmer. They may come out of hibernation early if the …
Bees Nests: Most of the calls we are getting at the moment are for bees. The warm weather had meant an influx of jobs, the majority of them being bees. For the first time this year we took over 25 jobs (yesterday) in a day.All of the wasp nest reported have been Mason Bees except …
Oak Processionary Moth Threat in Pangbourne: The Oak Processionary Moth is a pest on Oak Trees. They have been reported recently in the following areas: West and South-West London, the Bromley/Croydon area of South London, and the Pangbourne area of Berkshire. Normally their range is restricted to Southern Europe but they have been spreading northwards. …
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