Rapid Pest Control

This has to be the ugliest Chicken ever

August 15, 2010 By admin Leave a Comment

Let me introduce you to “Creda”. I’m guessing she has to be at least 12 years old as we have had her for 10 years. A friend of ours was moving house and couldn’t take her chickens with, so we adopted Creda and several other “normal” type chickens, all of which have long since bitten the dust.

We called her Creda as it looks like she has been through a wash cycle and tumble dried – not sure if it normal that clothes come out looking like this but most of mine do after Mrs Rapid Pest has washed them!

Every year, Creda has at least one set of chicks and is the best mother hen ever. She is fiercely defensive of all who dare go near and runs around clucking to keep the brood all together, teaching them to find the best food. Today alas was not a good day for her - Jasmine, my top working dog, decided that the chicks we just too tempting and nailed one. Its very difficult to stop them as we have been dogging in the pheasant chicks and the squeaking they make is similar, but never the less she had a sever telling off for doing it.

Creda has also been through the wars. Several years ago, I lit a large bonfire in the garden having cleared up a fallen tree. Unbeknown to me, Creda had decided this was a really good place for a nest as well. After the fire really took hold, I saw this “fireball” come racing out of the bonfire…which of course was Creda! I caught her quickly and dipped her in the duck pond, thinking that she would surely die from this, but although very bald (and even more ugly than now!), she survived and carried on as though nothing had happened.

This latest clutch of chicks is the first one to have a “Minime” Creda. Out of all the other chicks she has raised none have ever looked like her. Luckily this wasn’t the one killed this morning, so we hope this will be our Creda of the future.

If you have an even more Ugly looking chicken, please let me know – we should start an Ugly Chicken Facebook page! Email me your photos to help@rapid-pest-control.co.uk

Filed Under: pest control, Pest Prevention

DIY Pest Control – Time for some controls

August 13, 2010 By admin Leave a Comment

Last week, I tweeted about the plight of an innocent victim – a kitten – who got stuck on a glue board http://ht.ly/2mQnJ .

Well I was in one of the local country stores on Saturday, which sells a range of DIY products and devices for pest control. It was pouring with rain outside, so quite a few people were sheltering from the rain. As it happens, I was stood by the display of DIY pest control products and happened to overhear a young couple talking about the rodent problem they had.

They were looking at all sorts of products, but finally picked up some glue boards – they believed this was the best method of catching the rats as they didn’t like the thought of a nasty trap hitting the rat on the head….

At that point, I could not hold back any longer. I said to them “Sorry to butt in, but how do you think that works?” Anyway, we started chatting and they said that the rat will walk on and get caught – fair enough. So I said “And then what – once you have a rat, what are you going to do with it?” They both looked at one another, and the lady said “Let it go in the woods”.

So I spent the next 15 minutes describing how glue boards work and how the creature suffers when caught, that there is no way anything can be released from a glue board without major surgery, the humane dispatch of a live rodent and the risks to non target species plus the legal requirements professional pest controllers are bound to follow. Needless to say, the couple soon put the Glue Boards back! I am not a fan of glue boards, and I only use them as a last resort, having explained to the client all the aspects of using them.

To explain, a glue board is a large square or rectangle piece of cardboard, covered in highly sticky glue. These are deployed in known rat runs or baited to attract rodents on to them. When one foot is placed on, it will stick, causing the animal to place a second foot on and so on. The gruesome reality is that they struggle so much they literally pull themselves apart, or suffocate when so much flesh is stuck down they simply cannot move. Sometimes you find a live rodent caught in one and so they have to be humanely despatched – again this is another whole can of worms….I will explore this at a later date.

I went through the selection of control products with them and eventually, they chose some fairly good quality traps, which I advised them on baiting, setting and checking etc, and off they went.

I am not against DIY pest control, but there must be some controls. Glue boards should be professional use only, as should poisons. There is enough problems with secondary poisoning and poison resistance in rats without making the very products available to untrained users.

As a member of the Campaign for Responsible Rodenticide Use (CRRU), I want to see restrictions on the sale of all poisons across the counter. Only trained operatives should be able to buy and use such poisons.

So for advice and help with dealing with a rat problem or a mouse problem, contact Rapid Pest Control.

Filed Under: Agricultural pests, pest control, Pest Prevention

A fun hobby that might get you fit too

August 12, 2010 By admin Leave a Comment

Last night, Mrs Rapid Pest and I met up with an old friend and super techie who sorts out all our PC’s and network problems John Clarke of Solutions Shared. Luckily, we have not had to call on John’s skills for sometime as the Rapid Pest Control network has been pretty stable for some time, so meeting up with John was more a social event and just to catch up really.

We decided an Indian was in order so went to the new Indian Lounge in Newbury for a chat, a curry and a few well earned beers – I have to say the food was excellent and a pretty good price too!

As the evening went on and we all managed to catch up on things, John said that he and the family had discovered a new hobby called Geocaching. I must admit I did laugh a bit as it sounded a bit like train-spotting or a bit geeky, but as he explained it more, I thought it could be quite a fun thing to do as we walk the dogs miles so to do it with a purpose could be interesting.

Basically, there are thousands of small boxes hidden across the world, all tagged by grid reference coordinates, which basically you use GPS technology to find them. Once found, you log the find in the book within the box, and on the Geocache website, with a picture or a blog about the find.

All sounds a bit odd I know, but think of it as Orienteering without the running. Now I have a Garmin GPS which we use in Africa when out hunting to mark animals for collection once shot, so I am really familiar with the technology, but there is also some iPhone apps you can use. I decided to take a look and see what’s around our house, and guess what there are loads around Snelsmore and Newbury.

So today, Me and Mrs Rapid Pest picked 2 geocache locations off the website, set the coordinates in the Garmin and set off in search, with the dogs in tow.

We got to the first location in a few minutes, but spent 20 mins looking for the geocache – without success. So after deciding that it must have got lost, moved off to find the next one – which we did in a few seconds.

Once you find one, you get to know where to look, so we went back to the original one and found it straight away. The GPS is only accurate to about 20 feet, so you have to know how to interoperate the reading – its easy when you set a marker or way-point, but not so when entering coordinates. The iPhone app was really inaccurate and actually pretty rubbish.

The dogs thought we were totally mental, but they got a good walk, we got an hour away from the office and had some exercise and fun.

All I say is don’t knock it until you try it – it might not be everybody’s cup of tea, but we will be placing a geocache in Morocco when we go in September, there are a few around Agadir which we will hopefully find as well.

Thanks John – always good to see you!

Filed Under: pest control

Giant rats found in Hungerford

August 11, 2010 By admin Leave a Comment

I went to a wasp nest job on a horse farm just north of Hungerford recently. Nothing that unusual about this as for the last few weeks I have been just about everywhere in Berkshire dealing with wasps nests – hence few blogs as we have been so busy with the Yellow Army!

Anyway, I had a couple of nests to attend to on the farm, the owner of which was one of those really straight talking no nonsense Aussies – a real great guy who was full of complements about our quick response to his call (from call to visit was just over an hour). One nest was a ground nest in the field which had badly stung a prize horse on the face, and one in a mobile home which was about to be used for a riding academy, so a huge wasp nest in one of the bedrooms was not really going to make anybody happy.

He had bought a can down the DIY store to have a go himself, but when he opened the door and saw this nest, he changed his mind pretty quickly! I must admit it was pretty scary as there is not much room in these caravan so get out and they were pretty cross about everything, but I did the job and all was fine.

After taking off my suit, I popped into the yard to bid farewell, when Russ, the client, said in that great Aussie accent “Hey mate, do you do rats too?” to which I reply of course we do, ” Well we have some bloody giant rats here mate, do you think you can sort them?”. Always up for a challenge, I said “No worries, show me where they are”.

Well you could have knocked me over with a feather as when we walked around the corner of the shed, there facing me are 3 Wallaby’s!

Of course all the stable hands must have seen this type of show before, and were rolling around laughing at the shocked look on my face! I had to go and get the camera as nobody would ever believe me.

Its days like this that make doing this job truly fun – great clients and a good laugh. I cant wait to go up and visit again as the whole place had such a good atmosphere and a buzz (forgive the pun!).

If you have giant rats, contact us now so we can deal with them – we even deal with smaller rats and mice too! Or of course any pest problem!

Filed Under: Rat Control, Rat Problem

Bed Bugs in Swindon

July 11, 2010 By admin Leave a Comment

Bed Bugs have got to be the worst thing ever. Last week I did the initial treatment in a really nice house in Swindon.

The owners were pretty distraught with the whole thing by the time I arrived on the scene. Basically, they travel a lot and have recently come back from a tour of Srilanka where they visited quite a few hotels etc. One thing they did not expect to bring back home was a few bed bugs!

Unfortunately, bed bugs are normally transported via luggage and the first thing you do when you get home is dump the cases on your bed and start to unpack – giving them all the chance they need to get into your home.

As you don’t really expect to have them in your bed with you, you sort of don’t look for the signs of infestation either, again allowing them to start a breeding and feeding cycle before you realise it.

A month or so has passed since getting back from Srilanka and the client started getting some bites on her legs and elbows, and finally catching one in the act of feeding triggered the call to Rapid Pest Control!

A bed bug treatment has to be done very thoroughly and this involves a complete removal of all items from the room – clothes, shoes, bags etc which all have to be inspected, bagged and taken to be cleaned at high temperature, then the treatment can begin!

Bed bug treatments involve highly toxic insecticide dusts and sprays which need to be forced into literally every nook and cranny of every bit of furniture, skirting board, carpets and even light switches and sockets! These little devils hide in the most amazing spaces, and all must be treated. Needless to say, this operation is highly costly and labourious for all concerned – as well as traumatic for the occupants of the house.

The client has decided to invest in a new bed and mattress, so again the old bed must be wrapped up and sealed before being moved out of the room. They have also now invested in a mattress encasement to protect the new mattress from any further infestations – these encasements act as a barrier which does not allow any harbourage for insects – it is also effective against dust mites too.

I am back on Monday to do a second inspection to see if any further activity has occurred – the client has told me they have not had any further bites or discoveries and in fact have slept properly for the first time in weeks – so this is a good indication of an effective treatment, but I am always cautious of all such reports.

If you think you might have a problem with bed bugs, contract Rapid Pest Control now for advice and instruction on testing for them in your home or hotel.

One final tip, when travelling, spray the inside and outside of your cases with a DEET based bug spray – this does not kill them but acts as a good repellent – Jungle Jell etc is good – choose a 50% formula.

Filed Under: Bed Bugs

The link between Wasp Stings and heart attacks confirmed

July 11, 2010 By admin 1 Comment

Whilst wasp stings have always been regarded as extremely painful and it has long been recognised that individuals who are allergic to the wasp sting venom are at high risk of anaphylactic shock, little else has been linked to other adverse effects to our health.

Annually, it is estimated that in excess of 400,000 people seek medical advice regarding wasp stings, of which approximately 1,000 are hospitalised, and in the region of 12 people die from wasp stings, but frighteningly, recent medical research suggests this number could be in the thousands due to mis-diagnosis of heart attacks.

Greek physician, Dr Nicholas Kounis has discovered the link between an allergic reaction of the heart leading to acute myocardial infarction (or Heart Attack) brought on by wasp stings. This has been termed Kounis Syndrome.

Unlike other allergic reactions, with Kounis Syndrome there are frequently little or no other symptoms of this allergic reaction except for a heart attack. More recent and ongoing research is uncovering a delayed Kounis Syndrome which reveals that a heart attack may occur anything from 48hours to 2 weeks after a sting.

Kounis Syndrome is not restricted to wasp stings, but can be brought on by a number of agents like ant bites, jelly fish stings etc.

For more information of Kounis Syndrome check out this wiki entry

As if you needed anymore reasons to deal with that wasp nest!

For a same day response to wasp control and wasp nest removal in the Berkshire area, contact Rapid Pest Control now

Filed Under: Wasp Control Tagged With: Wasp Stings

A little bit of culture – a vast change from Pest Control!

June 29, 2010 By admin Leave a Comment

Last Saturday, the Chapple’s and the Hillier’s decided to try out the Opera for size.

With the promise of great weather, a cool box crammed with goodies to eat and plenty of the fizzy stuff, off we went to Newbury Race Course for an evening of open air Opera laid on by Opera Brava and New Greenham Trust.

None of us had ever been to the Opera, so it was going to be something completely new to us, but armed with an open mind, a brief synopsis of what it was all about and a bunch of booze, we were going to make an evening of it whatever happened.

We arrived early as we had heard that approx 2000 people would be attending, and when we arrived an hour before the start, most of them already had!

Anyway, we set up the picnic on the steps with a really good view of everything going on, got the fizz flowing and watched more and more people pile in – I really did not expect such a crowd. Then my phone started ringing as I was on call – several bee swarms were invading peoples gardens and one decided to attach itself to the TV aerial in one property. Not much can be done late on so booked them all in for Sunday morning…

Then the show started – the orchestra struck up and I was quite surprised that I knew the piece – I suppose school did do some good for me in Music afterall.

Then the actors kicked off, singing in English luckily so we were able to kind of follow the plot.

At the interval, the other half of the Hillier’s turned up as he had been working. Being a Wedding Photographer, his Saturdays are pretty well taken up, but he did manage to get away early.

I really did enjoy the event and would highly recommend it - especially to Opera virgins.

The show was well presented, the performers were top notch and the orchestra was superb. The only thing that let it down was the sound quality – this is a huge area and to get this right would have been a major achievement, but it was still very good.

After a quick pit-stop in Sainsbury’s to get more booze, we rounded off the evening sitting on the patio at our house with a roaring fire in the fire pit, drinking Brandy and Coke and talking complete rubbish until the wee hours!

So go on, do something different and go to the open air opera next year! See you there!!

Filed Under: Newbury, pest control

Bees swarms are very active in this warm weather

June 28, 2010 By admin Leave a Comment

Over the last few days, the number of calls I have had regarding bee swarms have pretty much hit record numbers.

Whilst this looks terrifying, provided you leave them well alone, you are in no danger. So why do they do this?

Simple really, they are just propagating and expanding the population.

A hive usually contains about 15,000 bees, but as the population of a hive expands, the honey store becomes overloaded and so time comes for a new Queen to hatch and move off to create a new colony.

Timing is everything and so as the hive fills, the bees know when to make preparations to leave. Worker bees start gorging themselves on the honey reserves, scout bees start looking for a suitable new home and then the new queen emerges from the specially created queen chambers in readiness to fly.

When she flies off, she emits a pheromone to guide the followers to where she is going. The followers then swirl around trying to pick up this scent – hence the clouds of random bees seen rising in the air. Once they get the scent, they follow the queen and then gather around her in a ball which could be hanging off a branch, a TV Ariel or just about anywhere. The swarm will continue to move as the queen does, guided by her scout bees until she decides the right spot is found, then the building of the nest can begin.

This is all pretty dramatic stuff and most people that call in are totally freaked out by all this – I must admit it is highly scary to suddenly have 10,000 bees hanging off your washing line!

We use several local bee-keepers to come and remove the swarms and take them to a purpose built hive which caters for the queens needs.

With this kind of weather, hot, still and pretty humid, the swarms generally are pretty mobile and may be there one minute and gone the next.

So if you see a swarm in your garden, don’t panic. Just keep away from them and do not attempt to disperse it. Best thing is to just call us at Rapid Pest Control on 07831 130636 and let us deal with it. Bees are under threat and the population is on the decline, so we very rarely have to kill them and our bee-keepers are always very grateful of new colonies.

Filed Under: Bees

A new addition to the Fallowfields herd

June 24, 2010 By admin

I regularly attend a network event – called the Oxsmeetup at Fallowfields Hotel located in Kingston Bagpuize,Oxfordshire.

This is one of my favourite venues as they have a small farm which produces pretty much all their own vegetables and meat served in the restaurant. All the animals and vegetables are produced to organic standards and that always appeals to me.

On my last visit Anthony shared the great news of the birth of a new dexter calf, so I could not resist going to see him.

Dexters are my favourite breed as they are full of character, usually pretty docile and friendly and produce excellent milk and beef. I was brought up on a dairy farm and we had standard dairy herds, mostly Herefords and Friesians which are known for their high milk production, but never had anything like Dexters.

The network meeting started out as a tweetup, but has moved to more of a social media marketing event as the technology evolves. The meetings are held once a month and are very informative as one of the main features of this event is the training sessions, then networking over a home cooked meal.

So why not go along and meet everybody – just click on the link and book

Filed Under: pest control, Pest Prevention

What’s the best way to get rid of rats?

June 16, 2010 By admin Leave a Comment

The best way to get rid of rats it to make it impossible for them to live in your garden!

Like us, rats need a few essential things to make your property its home; shelter, food and opportunity.

We get lots of calls from people saying they have rats and they can’t understand where they are coming from. Once we do a survey, they are pretty shocked at what we have found. Most people don’t see what we see and coming into a garden with “fresh” eyes highlights the issues immediate.

First thing we see is the bird table. This normally has bread, grain and left overs all over it and on the floor under it. Whilst feeding the birds is a great idea, feeding the local rat population has not been considered.

The next thing is usually that pile of garden rubbish or old boxes and junk which you never get round to taking up the tip. Showing the client the rat runs under and over this pile normally means that the car is soon loaded up and the rubbish taken to the dump!

Then there is the old shed. Everybody has them (I have 6 sheds and Mrs C goes mad at me about this! You can never have too many sheds….its a guy thing). Generally we find that the old shed has not been put on a concrete base and it has a false floor which allows big gaps under it…guess what that’s a perfect place for rats to make babies!

One of our recent clients was very typical of this pattern, the bird table overflowing, the rubbish in the corner and the old wonky shed, which was meant to have been taken down months ago but they have been so busy and then the baby came along…blah blah.

They commissioned us to do the whole clear-up, clear the rubbish, remove the old shed and lay a nice new concrete base for a brand new shed which they supplied, but we erected. All in a days work for Rapid Pest Control!

Now, with the food source gone, habitat gone – guess what? So have the rats!

If you have an old shed and want it removed, and a new shed base to be laid, call Rapid Pest Control now for a very competitive price. We can also supply new sheds too, even hand make them on site to suit your exact requirements.

Filed Under: Rat Control, Rat Problem