Hungry rats wreak havoc on Chimacum football equipment
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CHIMACUM, Wash. — Football is a big thing in Chimacum, but a horde of destructive rats have put one local team’s season in jeopardy.
In the chilly fall months, there’s not a lot for a 9- or 10-year olds to do in Jefferson County but play football. With the season just around the corner, coach Darrin Dotson drove to his storage locker last weekend to get the pads, blocking dummies and helmets.
“I opened up the door and there was about six inches of foam on the ground and it came spewing out on my feet,” Dotson said.
The destruction was the work of rats or mice.
“Yeah, one of these blocking dummies had a practice jersey pulled inside it, it was being used as a nest,” Dotson said.
Helmets were chewed and some were yellowed. Others were full of droppings. Dotson did his best to wash everything with bleach, but he said they still smell like a rodent restroom.
“I’m not going to use any of that gear,” he said. “To me, it is a complete loss. I am not going to take the responsibility for any child getting sick.” That means Dotson’s son, Cole, will have to wait to see if the league can raise enough money to buy new pads and equipment.
“I’ve used that stuff on my own time, too. I hate to see it destroyed,” Cole’s brother Lane said. “I hate rats. I hate that they did that to our stuff.”
The league had about $5,000 in its bank account, and it spent all but $1,000 of that on new helmets. But the big question is whether pads and other equipment will arrive in time for the team to be ready for its first game, which is scheduled for September 15.
League officials hope parents and local businesses will help them replace the rest of the damaged equipment.
By Bryan Johnson Published: Aug 15, 2012 at 5:43 PM PDTLast Updated: Aug 15, 2012 at 6:43 PM PDT WWW.KOMO4.COM
Ky. woman tries to kill bedbugs, burns down apt
Bellow is an article from the AP/CBS News. You don’t need to burn your house down to get rid of bed bugs. Just call your friendly Seattle Exterminators, Stop Bugging Me Pest Control. We use only proven bed bug extermination techniques, not the latest fad or gimmick. Stop Bugging Me offers Pest Control services in Bellevue, Seattle, Tacoma, Everett and throughout the greater Puget Sound.
(AP) CARLISLE, Ky. – Fire officials say a central Kentucky woman doused her couch in alcohol in an attempt to kill bed bugs, but dropped a lit cigarette on the furniture and started a fire.
WLEX-TV in Lexington reported that about 30 people in a Carlise apartment complex lost their homes in Friday night’s blaze.
Firefighters disappeared into the smoke as they climbed the ladder to make sure everyone was out the building.
It took hours to get a handle on the out of control fire.
Everyone made it out of the apartments, but four people were treated for smoke inhalation.
Complex resident Jackie Bond told the station that she lost everything, but “As long as everybody’s alive, I’ll find a way.”
© 2012 The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
Drinking too much booze each day keeps the bedbugs away
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A new study by researchers at the University of Nebraska shows that bedbugs are more likely to leave you alone the longer you stay at the bar. It turns out the terrible little vamps are picky drinkers and prefer the blood of the teetotaler to that of the binge drinker in direct proportion to the number of pints you’ve downed. This sounds like great news to the young and careless, but the researchers found a way to be buzzkills about it. “I’m not going to suggest someone should consume alcohol to control bedbugs,” said Ralph Narain, a Ph.D. candidate. Bummer. Guess we’ll have to just keep doing it for fun, then.
Study: Bed Bug “bombs: don’t work
Bed Bug bombs don’t work. That’s what a recent study conducted by The Ohio State University says. At Stop Bugging Me we provide proven bed bed pest control solutions. That’s why major hotel chains, property management companies and many others trust us with their bed bug control needs.
Study: Bed bug ‘bombs’ don’t work
Do-it-yourself “bombs” or “foggers” that target bugs by filling entire rooms with aerosol insecticide are billed as an easy, cost-effective alternative to pricey pro exterminators. Although these products are indeed cheap, retailing at hardware stores for around $10, if you use them on bed bugs you’re likely to get what you pay for.
In a new study, the first of its kind to be published, entomologists at Ohio State University tested three commercially available foggers – sold under the Hot Shot, Spectracide, and Eliminator brands, respectively – and concluded that all three products were virtually useless at fighting bed bug infestations.
Bed bugs in houses and apartments tend to be resistant to the insecticides used in most foggers, the study found, and even non-resistant bugs are likely to survive a fogging because the mist of chemicals doesn’t appear capable of penetrating the cracks in furniture and walls where bed bugs usually hide.
“Based on our findings, bug bombs should not be used for crawling insects such as bed bugs,” says lead researcher Susan C. Jones, Ph.D., an associate professor at the university. “These products shouldn’t even be labeled for bed bugs.”
Only one of the products tested, the Hot Shot Bedbug & Flea Fogger, specifically calls out bed bugs on its label, while the othersrefer broadly to “crawling” or “biting” insects.
Bed bugs are a major nuisance but generally don’t pose a threat to health, as their bites rarely cause more than itching welts or the occasional allergic reaction. Foggers, on the other hand, can be hazardous if used incorrectly.
In a 2008 report, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention indicated that at least 466 fogger-related injuries or illnesses were documented across eight states between 2001 and 2006. The most common ill effects—such as headaches, nausea, and coughing – tended to be minor and short-lived, although hospitalization was required in 21 cases.
Most incidents apparently involved people who didn’t leave the room quickly enough after setting off a fogger, or who reentered a room too soon. In addition, Jones says, the insecticides found in foggers (known as pyrethroids and pyrethrins) can contaminate surfaces such as kitchen counters, and the aerosol propellant used to disperse them is flammable.
The new study, which appears in the Journal of Economic Entomology, suggests that foggers are so ineffective against bed bugs that they probably don’t warrant even the small risk of harmful insecticide exposure or other hazards.
Jones and her colleagues began by collecting five different populations of bed bugs from residences in Columbus, Ohio. As a control group, they added a sixth population, known as the Harlan strain, that has been cultivated in alaboratory – and carefully sheltered from pesticides – since 1973.
The researchers then placed the various bed bug populations in petri dishes and exposed them to the foggers in a campus building slated for demolition. After one test, Jones recalls, “the Harlan bugs were keeled over and all of our field populations
In a second series of tests, the researchers added small shelters made of paper discs or cloth to the petri dishes. These shelters, which allowed the bugs to hide during fogging, were designed to mimic the bugs’ natural hideouts, such as the cracks and crevices in floorboards, along mattresses, and behind picture frames.
This time the fragile Harlan strain survived just fine. “The critical issue is that the droplets don’t penetrate cracks or crevices,” Jones says. “They don’t even get to where the bugs are hiding.”
So is there any way to get rid of these elusive critters?
Professional exterminators can wipe out an infestation, but they charge hundreds, if not thousands, of dollars, Jones says. Simple measures such as putting sheets in the dryer for 30 minutes, scouring mattresses with paper towels, and using a credit card to crush bugs hidden in floor boards and bed frames also can help reduce a population, she adds.
United Industries Corporation, which makes all three of the products tested in the study, emphasized in a statement that only the Hot Shot brand fogger is designed to be used on bedbugs. The company stood by its line of Hot Shot products, saying they are “proven to be effective against bed bugs.”
The Hot Shot fogger “is particularly effective when used in in conjunction with our bedbug-killing direct sprays,” said John Pailthorp, the company’s division vice president of marketing. “We advise homeowners to follow up with a repeat, full-scale treatment one to two weeks after the initial fogging to ensure that bedbugs have been eradicated. And, as always, we recommend a professional evaluation if the problem is particularly severe.”